Bad Places
by Goblin Cat KC
Summary: Leonardo returns battered physically and mentally from a bad place.
1. 1

****

Bad Places

by KC

Disclaimer: Ninja Turtles belong to someone else. Not me.

Rain and concrete. His whole world reduced to just two sensations, the rough concrete beneath his face and the rain stinging his skin, washing the blood away. He lay still for a long time, eyes closed. Lights flashed over his eyelids as a car passed nearby and disappeared.

Finally outside again. He opened his eyes and found his swords in front of him, their wet edges gleaming. They'd never been so sharp before. He'd sharpened them every spare moment, often depending on them alone to save him.

With a groan, he pushed himself up onto his knees and tipped his head back, letting the water run down his face. His arms hung limp at his sides. Hard to believe he was out, really out, in a soaked alley, drenched, alive. Mostly uninjured, even. He lowered his head and watched the blood rinse off his hands, pooling around him. Alive. He laughed once in relief, but he couldn't stop, his laughter turning hysterical and hurting his throat as it turned into one long scream.

It trailed off and he gasped for breath, not knowing why he screamed. Not triumph or success, not despair or anger either. He put his arms around himself to make sure he was still there. A faint scream miles away answered him. His first true smile appeared as the scream passed through him, full of frustration and gore. It quickly faded again.

"He made it," he whispered. "We both made it."

He wondered if Felix was walking back to his home by now, but soon gave up that thought. The man could take care of himself. He was probably thinking the same about him.

Only as his body started to shiver did he realize he was cold. He gathered his swords and slipped them into their drenched sheaths, then stood and followed the route home, barely aware of his movements. After being hyperaware for so long, the mindless routine of walking back was a relief. He didn't think about his master or siblings beyond the fact that they'd have questions he couldn't answer. Yet.

The lair was empty. He closed the door softly and turned on the light, heading first to the shower and dropping his swords on the way. Though he passed the mirror, he didn't look in. He already knew he was still covered in blood. With the shower turned as hot as he could stand, he stepped in and stared at the floor, watching red rivulets run down the drain. He wondered why it wasn't stopping, then remembered he was still wearing his bandana and paddings. He tossed them out on the floor. They were ruined anyway. He'd have to get a new sheath for his swords, too. The old ones were stiff with dried blood.

Finally he came out again and looked in the mirror. He blinked and looked closer. Aside from a few bruises and one healing burn, there was no sign of all the fighting and killing. He looked as strong as ever. Even his eyes looked brighter. He reminded himself of his swords, tempered and honed by use.

His footsteps echoed in the lair. Odd for everyone to be out, especially when one of them had been missing. He thought about trying to contact them, then remembered his communicator had been destroyed a long time ago. He frowned. How long? Where he had been, time had lost its meaning. He went into the kitchen and found the calendar open to July.

"Three months?" he whispered.

The calendar boxes were filled with scribbles in each of his brothers' handwriting, Donatello's neat letters as he marked the sewer and street directions he'd searched, Raphael's long scrawls about uptown alleys and corporate backways, and Michelangelo's round bubbles detailing the wharves and ocean shore. Numerous notes mentioned April or Casey, and he was certain Splinter had done his own share of searching.

"I'm sorry," he whispered to no one, "you couldn't find me no matter how hard you looked. I was in a game." He laughed once. "And I'm fine. No need to worry anymore."

He turned away from the calendar. Although he wasn't hungry, he figured he probably should eat something and opened the refrigerator. The first thing he saw was an open box of pizza.

__

--the smell of burning skin as the laser struck her arm and cut downwards with a spray of blood and tissue and she screamed and screamed and screamed--

He nearly didn't make it to the bathroom in time.

Something cold touched his face. Before his eyes had opened, his hand closed around someone's wrist and yanked it aside as he sat up. He winced as the room seemed to tilt around him and found that, unlike a few hours ago, his whole body was sore.

"Owowow, hey Leo, y'wanna let go?"

It took him a moment to recognize his youngest brother's voice. He opened his hand and looked up. Mike rubbed his wrist with a grimace, but the look in his eyes was nothing but relief. Even with his mask, Leo could see dark circles under his eyes.

"You guys never stopped looking," he said.

Mike shook his head. "Not once. The first night you didn't come back, we just thought you got pinned down before dawn and couldn't get away without being seen. We went out looking the second night, all the routes you usually take. After that, we looked everywhere, and I mean everywhere."

"Yeah, I saw the calendar," Leo said.

"Uh-huh, that was Raph's idea. I think we broke into every corporation and lab in town, just in case someone had caught ya. Splinter was at April's since we didn't wanna leave him here alone." He looked over his sibling. "Around the second month he started thinking you'd died. He couldn't find you when he was meditating. And there weren't any traces of you anywhere."

"I _was _gone," Leo said. "You wouldn't have found me, no matter how much you looked."

"What happened? Where were you?"

"A very bad place," he said. "I couldn't get out. I had no idea how much time had gone by until I got back."

"And you didn't get hurt?" Mike asked.

A bitter laugh came out of him, but he managed to bite it back before he went into another laughing fit. "Not for their lack of trying."

He glanced around himself. The room was dark, but he made out the shape of the door and the edges of a bed. His room, then. That explained the blanket over him. Weird, he didn't remember coming here.

Mike noticed his look and nodded. "I helped you in here. I came home a couple hours ago and found you passed out on the couch. You woke up a bit and let me get you into bed. Looked like you needed it."

"I don't remember that at all."

"What _do _you remember?"

"Coming home in the rain. Taking a shower. I was going to eat something but..."

__

--gunfire right next to him as he pressed down on the gash but she wouldn't stop bleeding. She was starting to turn pale and Felix yelling "I can't hold 'em back"--

"I don't think I'll be eating for awhile," he said.

Mike glanced out the door at something. "Your sheaths are more blood than leather."

"Not my fault. I hardly used them."

"Don noticed your bandanna first. I had to calm him down, he thought you were bleeding to death."

"They're all home?"

"Not yet. Don was just closest. Raph's on his way, he had to swing by April's and pick up Splinter." He noticed how Leo's eyes were closing again and sighed. "Why don't you get some more sleep? I'll come by later."

Leo nodded once and lay down without a word, turning away slightly. He heard Mike stand and leave, closing the door behind him, and then Donatello's voice as the two spoke in low whispers. And beneath that, he heard the echo of heavy footsteps and the scrape of claws against stone. He knew it was only water moving through pipes and whatever machinery Donatello was working on, but his mind heard it as the familiar sounds of the white crawling monsters and brown demon things searching for him, separated only by an unlocked door.

When sleep finally came, it was thankfully dreamless.

TBC...


	2. 2

****

Part 2

Mike shut the door to his brother's room and went to the main room, plopping down on the sofa with a sigh. He tipped his head back and stared at the ceiling, arms outstretched. For a moment he held his breath, then exhaled and let his body relax. Three months of worrying, pointless arguments and ignoring Casey's subtle hints that they may never find him, all slipped off his shoulders.

"How is he?" Don asked, sitting turned sideways to face him.

"Asleep again, I think." He stretched and yawned.

"But how is he? Did he say where he's been?"

"He's fine, he just looked sore," Mike shook his head. "Just that it was a bad place. I asked him if he'd been hurt, and he said 'not for their lack of trying'."

"He didn't say anything else?"

"No." Mike glanced at him, then at the table. Leonardo's gear lay on top, the rainsoaked sheaths still dripping reddish water on the floor. "Where could he get into a fight like that and none of us ever hear about it?"

Donatello shrugged. He started to answer, then looked back at Mike as he stifled a yawn. "Maybe you should get some sleep, too. You've been pushing yourself hard these last few weeks."

"I don't wanna," Mike said. He picked up the remote control, not to turn on the televisions but merely to turn it over in his hands. "I'm afraid I'm already asleep."

"Maybe I should ask if you're okay," Donatello said. "You've been kind of...flat, almost. I know we've all been worn pretty thin, especially with Casey--"

"It's not that. I'm just tired." Mike forced a smile but couldn't stifle a yawn anymore. "Okay, really tired. I think I went through every wharf and dock in the city."

"Go get some sleep," Don said. "It'll take Raph an hour to get back to April's, and then another hour to get everyone here. You can at least take a nap."

After a moment, Mike nodded and tossed the remote aside, groaning as he stood up. "Yeah, okay. I'll let you deal with everyone. But listen, I want first dibs on rubbing this in Casey's face."

"I think Raph's already beat you to it," Don said, but he couldn't help laughing. "Besides, I'm sure Casey doesn't mind being wrong at all."

When Leo woke up again, there was someone else in the room. Adrenalin surged through him and he sat straight, reaching for a sword and surprised when it wasn't there. He glanced wildly around the darkness, searching for an odd shape, a shadow in the midst of shadows, and breathed deep when he didn't find it. The only breathing was his. He leaned over and turned on the lamp, scanning the room one more time to make sure.

Cold chills went through his body and he forced himself to breathe. Alone, alone, he was alone. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood up, steadying himself as he swayed. In his rush to come home, he hadn't noticed, but the air seemed thinner than before, and he felt lighter. After stretching in a useless attempt to quiet his sore muscles, he stepped out of his bedroom.

The lair was dark. Every light was off, save that coming from Donatello's lab, but then that could have been one of his experiments glowing and Leo didn't want a repeat of the last time he'd looked in on that lab. He stepped in front of Raphael's door and listened. His brother's familiar snores and frequent mumbling came back. At each door, he stopped and listened to make sure they were all inside. No doubt they'd come into his room just to make sure he was there, alive and well, and then fallen asleep. He smiled. They were all fine. In his few quiet moments in the last three months, he'd worried.

He jumped down from the second level to the bottom floor, landing silently on all fours. As he stood, he looked around for his swords. He'd dropped them somewhere. One of his siblings must have picked them up. Or else Splinter had them. He stared at the door leading to his master's room for several moments, a dark door that hadn't gotten any smaller after he'd grown up. He looked away. That could wait.

He thought about checking the refrigerator again

__

--following Felix out the door and running over the chopped body parts, both of them nearly slipping on stairs slick with blood, the heat of the munitions at his back and bullets whistling past his face--

then went into the lair's practice room.

There were his swords, still bloody and gleaming, left in the corner waiting for someone to sharpen and polish them. That could wait, too. Holding them now would be too soon. He'd held them constantly through the last three months. They'd carried him through waves of glowing eyes and sharp teeth and claws that could take his head off in one swipe. He was grateful for those swords, hell he even loved them a little. But they could sit alone and untended for awhile yet. All three of them, two sharp edges and himself, had earned something like a rest.

"You're awake."

Leo whirled, muscles tense even after he recognized his brother in the doorway. Raphael held his hands up as he came in.

"Whoa, didn't mean to startle you. Figures, I leave to get a bite and that's when you walk off."

The only light came from the television sets on the other side of the lair and whatever was glowing in Donatello's lab, so that they both looked like animated shadows. Leonardo tilted his head and looked at him. "You were watching me?"

Raphael grimaced like he'd been found out. "All of us were, kinda. Making sure you're actually there and not just Mike's imagination." He folded his arms, frowning. "Making sure you didn't disappear again."

That stung more than he expected. "I didn't mean to disappear."

A skeptical grunt. Raphael would never believe that and stupid to think he would. "So, didn't notice any injuries on you. You out of practice."

Leo couldn't help a burst of laughter but it left again before it turned wild. "Hardly. Wanna see?"

"Yeah." Raphael dropped into a defensive stance. "Let me know if you get tired too fast."

The darkness wouldn't hinder their fight. If anything, it enhanced it, turning them into silhouettes, the background light only highlighting their outlines as if they were whirling sharp edges. A low sweep kick to send one of them backflipping out of its reach and countering with a plain kick as he went, a backhand that turned into a block and a blocked punch that grabbed the offered hand and yanked him off balance. A roll that dodged another punch, a sloppy mule kick that left him open to a kick in the stomach, and then an elbow catching his side that sent him sprawling on the floor. As Raphael pushed himself back up, he growled and rubbed his jaw where he'd hit the mat.

"You're not hurt at all," Raph said. "Hell, you're faster."

A bitter laugh, and Leonardo squashed it before it got out of control. Intense training, he thought, but he didn't say it.

"Where were you?" Instead of his earlier, friendly tone, Raphael turned accusative, blocking his way out instead of just standing in front of him. "Three months, Leo, we thought you were dead. Mike was the only one who was sure we'd find you, hell, even Splinter had given up. Casey was even saying you had to be dead. Where were you that he couldn't find you?"

Eyes lowered again, Leonardo shrugged. "A bad place, that's all."

"Bad place?" Raph said. "That's it?"

"Raph, I..." He paused, then shook his head. "I can't."

For a moment Raphael only looked at him, but he didn't move out of the way, either. "Talking can make it feel better," he said, repeating a speech he'd heard hundreds of times. He glanced down at the floor as if saying it embarrassed him.

"Thanks, but no."

"Leo. What. Happened."

"Can't you just let it go for now?"

"No! I leave for a night and get the damn inquisition. You leave for three months and don't expect us to ask questions?" Suddenly angry, Raph clenched his hands into fists, ready for another round. "Well, I'm asking. Where the hell were you?"

"A bad place."

"I need more than that."

His brother stood between him and the doorway. That was the only reason he didn't leave. He walked over to the corner with his swords and knelt, gathering a rag and sitting down crosslegged. Raphael was about to demand again when he started speaking in a low voice.

"It was dark most of the time," he said, working the rag down one side of the first sword. "There were lights, but they were broken. Some of them flickered, but...you couldn't really see much."

Silent now, Raphael sat down in front of him, listening.

"Halls, mostly, long halls that twisted around until you couldn't tell where you were. There were a few doors, some rooms. Not many. And things inside."

"Things?"

"Like animals. I think." He finished that sword, leaving the metal clear, and picked up the other one. "I could hardly see them. Some were so big we couldn't get by them even after they died, so we had to cut them apart and climb over. Most were small, though, and fast. God, they were faster than snakes."

"You said 'we'," Raph said. "You weren't alone?"

"There were three of us. I don't know what they look like, it was always too dark to see. Felix was big, though, and he said he'd been an army ranger. He could shoot and he used a knife almost as good as me."

"And the other guy?"

"A girl, Chanta, I think." He paused for a few seconds before starting again. "She shouldn't have been there."

"How come?"

"She was overweight, out of shape. She could barely keep up with us. But she could put a bullet into someone's eye a mile away, even in that dark." He closed his eyes, able to handle his swords without worrying about losing a finger. "We searched for a way out, but most of the time we were killing things. If we found a room with supplies, we'd barricade the door and sleep for awhile. Rest. Clean our weapons."

Raphael swallowed reflexively. His brother must have spent every night taking care of those swords the way he was doing right now. Before, he'd treated them like extensions of himself, never leaving them too far. He remade them when broken, he used them like his soul made manifest. Now he cleaned them like a soldier did a gun, a useful tool, a shield your life depended on, but nothing more. Methodical and necessary.

"You got out," he said. "What happened to them?"

"Felix got out with me." Leonardo stood up, leaving everything in a pile beside him. Despite several hours passing, the blood was still wet and left the rag soaked, his hands covered. He dropped the rag on the blades, not caring that it dripped on them again. He walked towards the door.

"Wait," Raph said, turning around but still seated. "Chanta, what about her?"

Leonardo paused, looking back. "I think she's dead. 'Least, I hope so." And he left his brother in the dark, crossing the lair to the stream that ran through Splinter's little garden, and washed what blood he could away.

Tbc...


	3. 3

****

Part 3

Only three turtles met Splinter at breakfast. The feeling of disappointment was tangible. Wordlessly Mike dug out the leftovers, heated Splinter's rice and served it all on the table, glancing at all of them as he sat down. All of them ate quietly, looking sometimes at the empty chair or at the doorway to Leo's room. The hurt of the past three months lifted, but this new feeling stung. The reunion they'd imagined wasn't happening.

"Is he awake yet?" Donatello asked in a low voice.

"Oh yeah," Raph said. He rubbed his sore jaw again, still bruised. "I don't think he went back to sleep after last night."

"You saw him?" Mike asked. "Did he say anything?"

"Yeah..." Raph grumbled and looked down. Leo hadn't made him promise not to tell, but it felt like a breach of trust anyway. "He told me a little. About that bad place."

Splinter put his bowl down and stared. "What did he tell you?"

"That it was a bunch of hallways full of creatures that him and two other people were killing, and that they were trying to find a way out." He looked at his master. "You shoulda' seen him. I've never seen him look the way he did when he talked about it."

"I heard fighting last night?" Splinter asked, but his tone said he already knew.

"He started it," Raph said and winced at how that sounded. "I mean he asked if I wanted to see if he'd gone soft."

Mike leaned forward before Splinter could reply. "Has he?"

"He's not as strong but he's faster," Raph said, shaking his head. "Put me on the ground in a couple of minutes." A thought struck him and he looked up. "Hey, has he eaten anything since he got back?"

Mike shrugged. "I didn't see anything out the first night."

"I'll ask him," Don said, pushing his empty plate aside. "I wanna make sure he's okay, too."

His tail tip twitching, Splinter nodded and stood up. "Very well. When you are done, tell him to come to my room afterward. I wish to speak to him."

Donatello nodded and left, heading upstairs. He peered inside Leonardo's room and found it quite dark. "Leo, you awake?" he whispered. There was no answer for a minute.

"...yes. You can turn on the light if you want."

After feeling along the wall for the switch, Don found it and flipped it on. His brother sat at the far end of the room beside his low table, shielding his eyes until they adjusted to the light. A layer of dust covered everything and he wished he'd cleaned the place regularly. They hadn't thought about such a little detail in the last few months. He walked across the room, painfully aware of the sound of his steps, and sat down at the table's corner. "You okay? Your eyes--"

"I'm all right. Just not used to the light yet." Leo sat with one leg out, one bent with his arm draped over the knee, head down. He'd found another bandana to replace the one they'd thrown away. "They send you to check on me?"

"Not quite." He gave his brother a quick look over for anything he might have missed before.

"You don't have examine me," Leo said without looking up. "I'm not hurt."

"Um, okay. Have you eaten anything yet?"

__

--they came around a corner and five of them, things on two legs with white hairless skin, dug their claws into the four legged gray thing to hold it down and ripped chunks off with sharp teeth. Blood spattered the walls and, headless, it screamed as its back legs were stripped to bones and it screamed--

"I'm not hungry."

"But you--"

"Not. Yet."

Shot that down. There might as well have been a wall between them. Don wondered what was so interesting about the damn floor. Three months and he couldn't spare a glance at him, couldn't act at least a little relieved to be home? He stared at the emotionless thing he wanted to call his brother. Rage, tears, depression, anything for God's sake, but not this automaton with Leonardo's face.

"What is it?" Donatello asked, not really sure what he was asking. He thought he was asking Leo what was wrong, but his brother seemed to take it differently.

"Taking the weight back."

The answer came in a whisper but in the quiet room, it sounded loud. Donatello frowned. What weight? "Huh?"

Leo didn't answer for a moment. Then he smiled and laughed once, humorlessly. "Nothing." He closed his eyes. "Raph told you?"

"About where you were?" Donatello nodded and glanced away, nervous even though his brother wasn't watching. "Yeah, something about hallways full of monsters, and two other people."

"That's it?" Leo looked up at him with wide eyes. "Nothing else?"

Stung that his brother was only looking up in surprise and not because he'd missed him over three months, Donatello frowned. "You wanna tell me what he left out?"

"Not really." Leo shook his head and sighed, back to looking at the floor. "Damn, did he even listen to most of it? Or maybe..." A long shot, but maybe Raph didn't want to betray what he thought was a confidential discussion. Figured, the first time he wanted his sibling to explain things to them in his place, Raph grew some ethics and kept it to himself.

"Well, if you won't talk to me, Splinter wants to see you in his room." Don didn't try to hide the frustration in his voice as he stood up and went to leave. "He's probably there waiting."

Wincing, Leo called his brother's name. When Donatello stopped and turned, Leo didn't look up but spoke to him anyway.

"Don, I..." He took a deep breath and let it out. "I can't. Not yet. I need more time..."

"...I'll tell Splinter--"

"No, not about that." Leonardo clenched his hands into fists, concentrating as if he fought to form each word. "I can't be like...like I was. Not yet."

In his mind Donatello kicked himself. His older brother had gone through something traumatic and here he was expecting him to bounce back, no problems, happy to be here and boy do I have a story for you. How much more insensitive could he be? "It's all right. I'm sorry." He smiled and shrugged. "I guess we're just so excited you're back we didn't think."

"It's all right. I'd better see him now anyway." Leo pushed himself up and walked past him, eyes lowered and arms crossed.

Donatello thought he looked like he was heading for a scolding, but dismissed it as his imagination and his brother's depression. He followed after him, jumping to the bottom floor and joining Raph and Mike at the table while Leo disappeared inside Splinter's room.

"Is he okay?" Mike asked. "He looks worn."

"He wasn't nothing like that last night," Raph said.

"That's good to know," Donatello said. "I think he's just tired. I'm sure Splinter'll be able to help. He needs time."

"Yeah," Raph said. "Kinda stupid to think he'd come back and everything would be all right, huh?"

Donatello swirled his coffee around before he finished it. Cold. "Yeah, stupid."

At least Splinter's room was dark. Leonardo closed the door softly and sat down in front of his master, one lit candle among many others unlit burning between them. One of their training exercises had been to snatch the candle from Splinter's hand. Now he thought he could snatch the flame from the candle itself. He watched the still flame burn until Splinter raised his head, the slight motion sending the flame twisting in panic.

"Leonardo..."

He waited, shoulders tense as he waited for the questions.

"You are uninjured?"

"...yes, master."

"Good." Splinter took a long match out of a box beside him and touched the head to the flame, sending it up in an angry hiss of smoke. One by one, he lit candles around himself, driving the darkness back. "You were gone a long time."

"I know, master. I'm sorry."

"Your brothers searched the entire city. They put themselves at great risk in their attempt to find you." The match burned lower, coming closer to his fingers. "And protected Miss O'Neil's shop from local criminals."

Leonardo raised his eyes, asking his question wordlessly. His small surprise would save him the trouble of speaking.

"Yes, it is rebuilt. She had to explain how fire insurance works." Most of the candles were lit now, and he shook the flame off the match, setting down the burned stick. "For three months, your brothers were left to themselves. Is this as it should be?"

"...no master."

"You told Raphael you searched for a way to escape."

"Yes, master."

"And revealed yourself to two humans in the process."

"No, master. It was constantly dark, light was rare and we only sighted our enemy during it." He winced as it all came in a rush, but it was true enough. "They never knew what I am."

"At least there is that, then." Splinter exhaled and a heavy weight seemed to come off his shoulders. "I am honestly relieved you are well, Leonardo, but to know so little about your absence and to have your brothers alone for so long...was tiring." His tail flipped once behind him and he lay a hand on Leonardo's shoulder. "You are their older brother. You must be here to protect them. To leave them for so long...and in such danger..."

"I'm sorry, master." Bit by bit the weight settled on his back, just as crushing as he remembered. He'd had a whole day off, though, couldn't complain. The candles burned bright around him, fire filling the air and turning the room as red as blood, dripping down the walls and Splinter's face as the flames flickered.

"I do not blame you," Splinter said. "I'm sure you returned as quickly as you could. But I am just as glad to see you are well, so you may again shoulder this responsibility. I shall bring you up to date on Miss O'Neil's situation, as that is the most pressing problem facing us. I believe that Michelangelo allowed himself to be seen on one of his runs, but as nothing has come of that yet, we may ignore it for now."

Business as usual. There was some relief in that, that he'd come through this discussion so easily. The unspoken rebuke still hung in the air but he didn't have to hear it. He listened to his master explain their recent fights with an off-shoot of the Purple Dragons, the Five Claws, and how they'd manage to only drive them off.

"How many are there?" he asked.

"At least twenty," Splinter said. "All well armed. You see now why your brothers require your presence. April's is the only business on that street untouched, and they will certainly be back. It's been a week now. They grow bold again, having forgotten the pain we inflicted."

He nodded. "Then I should stay at her shop. If activity increases, I can call you while still protecting April."

Splinter hesitated a moment. "I agree, but I think you'd best remain here a few days, re-center yourself. There is time yet and you should rest."

Recognizing the dismissal, Leonardo nodded once and stood to leave. The scent of smoke followed him out. He didn't even consider joining his brothers (who all looked up, faster than before but still their reaction time was too slow, they should be training) at the table or even snatching something out of the fridge--

__

--Felix fired before the door even opened all the way--

but went back to his room, turning off the lights as he went. He had an order to rest and he would take advantage of it. Sleep would take him back to the endless maze from the time he closed his eyes until he opened them again, but he could lie on his bed and watch the light from downstairs send shadows waving across the ceiling.

TBC...

1. I thank you for the reviews. I save each one and often reread them.

2. Things will indeed quicken. Things will get much worse and much better, all at once in different ways. But this slow pace is necessary for the next few chapters.


	4. 4

****

Part 4

On the first day Leonardo remained in his room, fighting off sleep for hours until he crashed, falling past dreams and into a calm nothingness. When he woke up, he didn't know how much time had passed but the lair was dark and he didn't hear anyone else, so he guessed he'd slept the entire day. He lay still for several minutes, and as he grew less drowsy, a heavy soreness crept over his body. As he adjusted himself on his bed, each movement made a muscle ache or a joint protest.

The stream on the lower floor flowed loud enough for him to hear it. If no one else was awake, he could sit on the small bridge Splinter had made them build and watch the water go by. He sat up slowly, wincing as a dull throb started in his head. Memories of being thrown against a wall, falling down flights of stairs, punches from creatures twelve feet tall or even simple flying debris, chunks of masonry exploded towards him, all came up, and he figured that he'd feel the headache now that the distraction wouldn't matter. All things considered, he was lucky he didn't have a concussion.

He turned on the paper lantern beside his bed and shielded his eyes until it wasn't so bright. On the table, a tall bottle of water stood next to an apple and a folded note. He picked up the note and read Donatello's messy script.

__

April bought us some groceries. There's plenty in the fridge. Even if you don't eat anything, at least drink some water. Splinter said something about you going to her place and Raph'll never let you live it down if you collapse during a fight.

Leo half smiled and set it aside, looking at the bottle and apple. For once he didn't feel sick, but that was because they resembled the scant supplies they'd occasionally scavenged. Canteens and rations were the norm, and the small amount here made it possible to eat. As long as it wasn't so big or colored so that it looked like severed limbs or flayed skin or...he grimaced and pushed that out of his head. Water and apple. He could deal with that.

Finished, he headed downstairs. The stream made the only noise, water rushing from somewhere off into nothing. He stepped onto the bridge and sat down, watching the water go by. A blue glow came from the monitors on standby in the corner, and the light highlighted the water's surface, black with silver ripples. Looking into it gave the illusion of stars, like a substitute night sky.

He wondered where it disappeared to. It seemed too clear to come from the city, he was sure it came from the ocean. Its scent even had a tinge of salt to it. Michelangelo often joked about sharks swimming upstream, but if he thought about, that wasn't all that farfetched. They'd never explored the stream and he often wondered if it was a security risk. Probably not. Just another instance of what Raphael called the paranoid perfect leader.

He never told Raph he had dreams of pitching his brother headfirst into the water.

With a quick glance to make sure he was alone, he got up and walked around to the stream's edge, then eased into the water. It wasn't deep, only a couple feet, and it flowed strong enough to force him to brace himself from being swept back. Amazing that it could be so clean. He held his hands out on the surface. His arms still ached but the water was near freezing and took the soreness with it.

A deep breath, and then he knelt, submersing himself entirely. Louder underneath, the water roared as it rushed by and tried to take him with it. He opened his eyes and watched it come at him, seeing only the light filtered a few inches down. Unable to make out the edges of the walls, it was like sheer motion embodied running over him and through him and away. He didn't want to look behind himself. The water was taking something out of him and he didn't want to see.

After some time, he wasn't sure how long, he stood again and shivered. The pain was gone, at least for now, and he climbed back onto the floor. Pain was replaced by cold, but it was a fair trade. He didn't head for the bathroom towels but instead went into the practice room. He flipped on the lights and one of the light bulbs popped and died, leaving one corner dim. His swords lay in that corner, clean and side by side. One of his brothers had probably done that. New sheaths lay beside them, clean and unmarked by claw marks.

He briefly wondered if his old sheaths were so ruined that he couldn't use them again, clean them up and repair them. Throwing them away felt like a betrayal. He turned away. Stupid.

His body didn't want to practice but he forced himself through kata after kata, stumbling a little as he went through moves he hadn't practiced in months. Move by move, he went through them slowly, less for actual practice and more to calm himself. Mind numbing routine could block out some of the worse memories. He hadn't thought of her except twice now and he wanted to keep it that way.

Some perfect leader.

Real perfect.

Damn.

He stopped, standing still for several seconds, arms out in a move that would've blocked a hit and disarmed his opponent in one motion. A useless movement now that he thought about it. He'd never used it in real combat. And not once had he'd used it in the game.

__

--"A simple game, like running a maze, only I'll be surprised if any of you make it through. When you're bleeding to death with one of my creatures chewing your throat, just remember that it's all in the name of science. I'll be sure to name my new discover after one of you."--

Pure killing moves. Forget any notions of fair play and honor, save for helping the guy next to you and fighting the urge to leave the girl behind because she was too slow. She could take out the bigger ones before they got too close, and he could nail the fast little ones when they got by his swords.

And then she was gone. That it was inevitable didn't help. That they made it didn't help. And the next time he saw that bastard--

He dropped out of the block and into a duck that would avoid sharp slicing claws, then a kick that would sweep its legs out. As it fell, something small and quick bounded over its body, mouth gaping wide so that its teeth caught the only bit of light for a moment. Instead of ducking, he spun to his left to avoid it and slashed backwards, cutting it in half. It hit the floor and slid to a stop, and he was already turning to decapitate a more humanoid shambling thing. Blood sprayed the walls and it fell backwards as the larger thing he'd tripped got back to its feet.

Now he had room to slice low and take its legs off properly, and he cut up as it fell, cutting through its chest and carving through its shoulder. Another small thing leaped off the wall at him and he had to overextend himself to run it through, leaving him open to a white pale thing dropping off the ceiling. A long knife flicked over its skin and disemboweled it so that it would have died if it hadn't hit the wall so fast that its neck broke. Or at least, something inside it snapped, probably not a neck since it didn't seem to have one. He would have said thanks, except there was another one, and another, and another, and another...

Killing moves. Those were useful. Pain disappeared as he replayed fight after fight, side by side with an ally he didn't have to worry about, didn't need someone to look after and protect him. For a little while, the weight lightened and went away.

The sound of Splinter's tail sliding across the floor broke him out of the memory. If it was dragging on the floor, that meant his master had just woken up and he had time to return to his room. After practicing for so long, he was tired--

Wait. He wasn't tired. He looked down and saw that he was still in the block, arms out and one hand open to grab the hilt of a sword, instead of the low and extended slash he thought he'd been in. How long had he been standing like that? He slowly stood straight, each movement pulling a sore muscle. Heading for the door, he gathered his swords and new sheaths as he went. He moved quietly by his master's door, knowing Splinter probably heard him go by and wondered why he'd been so quiet in the practice room. Maybe he thought he'd been meditating.

He was back in his room when his master came out and began rousing his brothers. He listened to their grumbling as they woke up, as they found out he still wasn't coming down for breakfast, and as they headed off to the practice room. When Donatello came up to his room to see if he'd eaten, he feigned sleep. Another apple and water bottle were left. Sometime during the day he fell asleep again, and perhaps because he'd already revisited the game, he didn't dream about it.

Just as his brothers were going back to bed, he woke up again. Back down to the practice room again. The soreness gradually went away but the memories didn't. He repeated this for two more days.

On the fourth day, Splinter met him in the practice room. The Five Talons would strike soon. He had to go to April's immediately. Before anyone else woke up, he took up his swords, picked up his worn copy of Sun Tzu, and left.

A few minutes moving through the tunnels took him to a manhole cover and up onto the street. A warm breeze blew through the alleys as he walked, the sounds of distant cars and rats digging through trash faint in the night air. He kept to the shadows and dark corners until he found a conveniently closed dumpster next to a fire escape. A good leap off of the dumpster got him to the bottom railing and he climbed to the roof from there. After that, his trip went much easier, leaping the gaps between buildings and occasionally using the streetlights as stepping stones from one low rooftop to the next.

Once he reached April's block, he came down to the alleys again and looked around. No one was out but the Five Talons had left symbols spray painted everywhere. He stopped and examined one, surprised by the amount of skill involved in making the five dragon's claws, white with blue edges, curled as if reaching towards the viewer. More intricate than anything else spray painted nearby, this had obviously taken a long time to make and meant they weren't afraid of anyone.

He noticed there were fewer as he got near April's shop, and none around her place. Obviously they were afraid of his brothers, at least for now. He came around the back and snuck in, bypassing her burglar alarm and creeping through the hall. The last time he'd seen her, she'd been training with Splinter and he wanted to see how far she'd come.

As luck had it, he spotted her practicing with a single katana, carefully moving through an intermediate kata. Her motions were rough and jerky, but he could see the improvement. A few more months and she might be an interesting exercise. Not a challenge, yet, but an exercise. He knew the kata and waited until she turned her back to him, then crept up behind her and tapped her shoulder.

"Surprise."

"Yiieee!" The katana clattered to the floor and she spun around, falling backwards until he caught her waist and helped her steady. She gasped and put one hand on her shoulder, glaring. "Darn it, Mike, I told you never to...Leo?"

He didn't get to answer. She threw her arms around him and hugged him fiercely, tears starting to squeeze out of her eyes.

"Oh my God it's really you! I mean, I know Donatello told me and Raph kind of rubbed it in Casey's face and Mike swore you were fine but I was still kind of edgy 'cause you were gone so long where were you and oh it's so good to see you again!"

He smiled and hugged her back. "I take it you missed me?"

"We all did..." She leaned back and looked at him. "You all right? You were gone for so long."

"I'm fine. A little tired. But better now."

After a moment, he realized Splinter or one of his brothers must have told her not to ask too many questions, since she didn't ask where he'd been or what had happened, and he knew she had to be curious. She took him downstairs to the basement where Splinter had stayed during his absence, and filled him in a bit more on her problems. The Five Talons had recruited a few more members, mostly guns and girls but one was apparently very accurate with a knife and another extremely fast with a shotgun. Fast, since aiming isn't all that important with a shotgun.

"Shouldn't be too bad," Leo said, glancing around the room. There were four futons, a small refrigerator and a television, and a bookshelf in the corner. He tossed his book on the nearest bed and tried not to look too eager. "The others should be here tomorrow. I doubt they'll try anything too soon."

"I kind of wish they would," she said, "just to get it over with. Oh well, I guess it'll come fast enough."

"It'll be all right," he said. "We've handled worse."

Once she left, he sat down and started to read. Nothing would happen until the sun went down, of that he was sure, and for now he wanted to review old rules and tactics he'd begun to forget.

"When an army marches through mountains, forests, precipitous land, swamps, or any place that is dangerous to march, it is moving on difficult ground."

"Ground that has a narrow access and tortuous exit, whereby the smaller enemy force can crush my larger one, is enclosed ground."

"Ground in which only a desperate fight may offer survival is death ground."

"Therefore, on difficult ground, keep moving."

"On enclosed ground, devise stratagems."

"On death ground, fight."

TBC...

Note: "The Art of War" by Sunzi or Sun Tzu, depending on your translation. Available online for free in many places and worth the read.


	5. 5

****

Part 5

Waiting for an attack wouldn't let him sleep. April was right, better to get it over with. He'd finished his book several times over and none of the books left behind by his master and brothers looked interesting, so he pushed the futons against the wall and began practicing. As much as he hated the nameless things, they were the only things he could fight against. Imagined human enemies moved too slow, had no claws, couldn't see in the dark. All they had were guns and cunning, but the things were cunning, too, and came from all directions. Anything less moved too slow.

Halfway through a roundhouse kick, he felt it. He tried a few more punches, a sweep kick, but he was off. What had come so effortlessly the past few nights now refused to come at all. The air dragged on his arms, gravity pulled at his legs. Right now it wasn't much, but it was starting. Despite all the practice he'd done, nothing but practice, he couldn't stop it from happening.

"I'm slowing down."

Throwing his mind back in time to some of their hardest fighting, he cleared corridors of monsters, dodging teeth, ducking claws, leaping over something on four legs with shoulders as big as a bull's. Everything was as real in his mind as during those months, he slipped on blood, breathed air so cold his breath misted, shuddered when he thought he touched one of the little things, but it didn't help. He landed back in April's basement, kneeling with his head down, hot and frustrated, breathing hard.

"Now I know why samurai used to train against other samurai," Leo whispered. "There's no point in training if it's not to the death. It's not real."

With a tired sigh, he crossed the room and leaned against the bookcase, hoping he'd missed a comic book or history text. One by one he scanned each title, Donatello's new chemistry books, Mike's cookbooks, Raph's...hm. Nothing there.

"Hey there!"

He'd thrown a book before he realized he'd grabbed it and turned. It was out of his hand by the time he saw Casey in the doorway, dodging the thick book before it slammed into the wall behind him. Leo's shoulders slumped as he relaxed again. "Damn it, don't do that."

"You're telling me?" Casey bent and picked up the book, reading the title. "Heh, Practical Aerodynamics. Raph said you'd gotten faster. Boy, he wasn't kidding." He grinned and put the book back on the shelf as an excuse to come inside. "You know, I think that's the first time I've ever snuck up on you."

"Don't get used to it," Leo said, forcing a smile. Even if he was slowing down, his reflexes were still wound tight. If they'd been in the kitchen, if that had been a knife and not a heavy, slow book... "I'm just distracted right now."

"Yeah...'bout that..." Casey scratched the back of his head, wondering how to phrase it. "Listen, you've probably heard what I started saying an'--"

"Casey, it's not--"

"Yeah, it is. I shouldn't of said you weren't coming back. 'Cause, like, obviously ya did and all."

"Actually, I wish you'd managed to keep them home."

"Huh?"

Leonardo shrugged and shook his head. "They wouldn't have found me anyway. And they would have been safer. Master Splinter said Mike got seen."

"Nah, that was just Raph being paranoid."

"Raphael?" Leonardo blinked. "Paranoid?"

"Go figure. The moment we knew you were gone, he turned worse than you." Casey laughed and leaned against the wall, folding his arms. "Man, you shoulda' seen him. Assigning parts of the city, keeping schedule, pulling double shifts to keep this place safe. It was like you two switched masks."

Odd to think that hurt more than Splinter scolding him. "Figures he'd do it when I'm gone," he said, more to himself than Casey. "Then none of them got hurt?"

"Well, Mike didn't get much sleep with all his running around and Donny nearly electrocuted himself working on something for April. But they were all fine. Except for being worried sick, I mean."

"Mm." Leo heard the unasked question. Where have you been and it better be a good reason you couldn't get back. For all their concern and support, that demand lay at the bottom of every happy welcoming and smile. Why didn't you come back for so long? He opened his mouth to ask if Raph had enjoyed his new responsibilities, but he stopped himself. He tilted his head slightly, listening. There it was again, louder this time.

"What?" Casey stood straight, instantly alert. "What do you hear?"

"They're coming now," Leo said, heading for the door with Casey right behind him. "I can hear their chains."

The shop lights were already off when they came up, and April stood beside the main window watching the street. Leo wasn't sure if it was the same night or the next night, just that the street was dark and only one streetlamp lit the block. Even the moon and stars were covered by thick clouds. "Both of you, stay inside in case I miss any of 'em. Don't come out, no matter what."

Before they could argue, he went upstairs and out a rear second story window, climbing up to the roof. No one would spot him there and he could get a good look at his enemies. Some extra wiring and dark shapes lined the roof, Donatello's work no doubt, and he ignored it as he leaned over the ledge. The air smelled of impending rain and he hoped the storm would hold off until the fight finished.

Twenty or thirty of them gathered in front of the shop, some of them dragging chains on the pavement to let everyone know they were there. A few of them carried knives or baseball bats. Most of them had guns of some type, from the girls carrying light automatics to the men carrying heavy handguns and one shotgun in particular. All of them wore a white dragon's claw patch on their shoulder. If they'd taken over most of this neighborhood, no doubt they knew how to fight in close quarters with all those firearms. Speed and deception would be vital.

Slowly he unsheathed his swords, breathing in as the metal hissed. All the aches and pain left his body in a rush, replaced by trembling anticipation. He wasn't scared, far from it. Adrenaline surged through him and overwhelmed him, winding him tight. He'd come with two smoke bombs ready and he took one of them out now, holding both it and one sword in his hand.

Each side stood tense, waiting for the first move.

A gun was cocked, the click echoing down the street. The bomb exploded in their midst, sending thick black smoke over the ground and up around them. Several of them coughed it out of their lungs and fell back. Most of them cocked their weapons and started for the shop, thinking it had come from there.

The few who looked up into the night sky would swear later that a demon had leaped amongst them, claws as long as swords ripping indiscriminately into them. Instead of hiding in the smoke, Leonardo moved through it and back into the shadows, letting them fire at the swirling shapes. Human shrieks filled the air as they shot themselves and riddled the walls and cars parked nearby full of bullets. Their heat passed close to his face and he slid farther away from the blind firefight, intent on the handful who hadn't panicked.

"Quit shooting, you idiots!" one of them yelled. "It ain't in there!"

The wind blew the last wisps of smoke away, leaving only five or six talons still standing and the rest on the ground amidst splatters of blood. The lucky ones groaned and clutched at their wounds, trying to stop the bleeding before shock set in. The few who could still move got on their hands and knees and crawled towards safety.

The calm veterans pulled back out of the light, using his own tactics. A shotgun blast drowned every other noise for an instant and cleared one part of the street. A second blast came right after that, a little to right, and then another shot as fast as he could reload, trying to drive Leonardo one way and into the light, where a few with bats and chains waited. Angered by his trick, they stood in a circle around the light, a living net for their own trap.

An old car, more bullet-riddled rust and shattered glass than metal, stood between their killing ground and the light. It was his only real cover and he hated kneeling behind it. So far he'd been playing by their rules, by Splinter's rules, and it left him stilted and awkward. He hadn't killed any of them. He shook his head.

He finally had a real fight to the death against modern samurai. He would not waste it.

First things first. His throwing star sailed true into the lamp, shattered plastic and glass and showered the talons below as the lamp flashed and went dark. He used the car hood as a spring board to leap over their blind shots, sinking one sword into a shoulder and jerking it free. Blood arced into the air, a red ribbon in the dim light. The scream this time was higher pitched, wild with shock, and he followed with a deep cut to his enemy's abdomen. As he darted left for his next victim, someone fired at where he'd been a second before, hitting whoever he'd just cut apart. The screaming stopped.

Inside the store, April knelt on the floor, peeking out over the bottom of the window, somehow still intact after the firefight. "Can you see him?"

"Not a bit," Casey whispered back. "Sounds real bad out there."

"We've got to get the lights back up," she said.

"I think Leo's the one who hit the lamp," he said. "If we get 'em on now--"

"He might be hurt out there and we wouldn't know," she said, already crawling towards the light panel behind the counter. "Don helped me put in floodlights on the front. Help me turn 'em on."

"But if you turn them on while he's fighting--"

"Casey!" She looked over her shoulder and glared. "He's not invincible and God knows what he went through for three months. Now help me get these lights on."

He grumbled and put his useless hockey stick back in its case. "Fine, fine. Pushy dame..."

Out on the street, the fight continued. A slice across the back sent the enemy spinning just like in the samurai movies he occasionally watched with Raphael. A cut down the face and throat stopped them in their tracks and usually drove them to the ground. He couldn't see the blood anymore but he could hear it when they weren't shooting or swinging a chain at his head. A shotgun blast carved into the crowd, and only because several had been between him and the blast did he avoid the shot.

This was what he'd been missing, this was the brutality that would drive him faster. The air no longer dragged but flowed with him. Gravity gave his spin kicks a driving force that shattered bones. The darkness could not blind him, the noise could not deafen him. His blood sang with his rhythm, cut, kick, dodge, slice, turn, stab.

And then he noticed that someone else knew the song, followed his rhythm and matched him perfectly. Was everyone else dead or gone? Had to be, the street had gone silent save for their breathing. The knife user, he realized, the one Splinter had warned him about. Too big to be female, too fast to be normal. Steel passed close to his face as he bent backwards, using a backflip to kick at his opponent. It didn't connect as his enemy backed up and then came forward, slashing with perfect aim at his throat. Neither had to see the other to fight.

He backflipped several times, followed close by that knife. It was long, he could sense that much, with a wicked serrated edge flashing in the dim light. Straight out of a backflip he crouched on all fours and swept his enemy's feet out from under him. The knife user fell backwards, out of the range of his swords, but he could still knock the blade out of his hands. He caught the metal edge and sent it flying, clattering in the dark.

Metal slid across the pavement, and he realized the knife user had scooped up a fallen gun. A single shot flew by his shoulder as he spun to one side, then spun again as the second shot came, lucky his enemy hadn't picked up an automatic. One more shot came so close he fell to his side, dropping one sword so he could push himself out of the way of the next shot.

End it now, he thought, before he does. Sacrificing defense in a suicide leap, he closed the distance between them and fell to one knee, narrowly dodging a shot that burned his shoulder. He whipped his sword up to drive it into his enemy's throat, and at the same time felt the heat of the barrel directly in front of his face. The hammer cocked. He breathed deep and started the thrust.

Light suddenly flooded the street, and they both stared at each other, eyes growing wide. Leonardo looked around the gun at the dark black face framed by dreadlocks and the frayed army fatigues.

"Felix?"

"Leo?"

Stunned, they held still for several seconds, both one step from killing the other. Around them, several bodies lined the street, most of them shot and some still moving. Blood painted the concrete and sparkled in the light. Leo swallowed reflexively.

"Do we still have to kill each other?" he asked, suddenly sounding as young as he really was.

In the harsh light, Felix's face and hands betrayed his age, lines and faint scars showing he had to be in his late thirties at least. For his part, the human stared at Leonardo, confirming his suspicions about what he'd seen in brief flashes as they guarded each other's back.

"Be kinda stupid to do you in after all that." Slowly he turned the barrel away from Leonardo's face toward the street, releasing the hammer. Leo drew his sword back and slipped it into its sheathe. Both of them were covered in blood, and the clouds finally let down the rain. Red water ran down their bodies and mixed on the street.

"Damn..." Felix said, slowly grinning. "I thought I was hallucinating down there. I couldn't believe you were a freakin' turtle."

Leonardo bent and retrieved his dropped sword, sheathing it. "And you kept complaining you couldn't keep up with me."

"Heh, yeah. That is kind of ironic."

Their half-hearted laugh turned into a chuckle, then louder, until soon they were laughing uncontrollably. Both revved up on adrenaline and too exhausted to move anymore, they sank to the ground, as April and Casey watched them laugh amongst the dead and the dying, shivering in the cold rain. She pressed herself against Casey's side as she took in the carnage and wondered if this was where she wanted her sword practice to take her.

TBC... 


	6. 6

****

Part 6

Huddled under umbrellas, a small crowd gathered behind the barricades and cars as police picked their way through the street and photographed the bodies. Ambulances had already rushed away the survivors. Body bags lined the sidewalk, some of them so flat that people wondered how anyone could be inside. The rain was beginning to let up, turning into a mist that sparkled on the shattered glass and police cars.

April finished giving her statement to an officer and wandered through the crowd until she spotted Casey being interviewed by another policewoman. Instead of going right over to him, she looked at the street in front of her shop, a little less messy now that the pieces had been picked up, but it would be hours before the police finished collecting every bit of evidence and washed away the blood. She put her hand to her mouth and walked quickly to Casey's side.

"--turned on the lights, I didn't get to see what was going on outside." Casey scratched the back of his head, doing his best to act like a clueless boyfriend. "It just sounded like a war out there, all those guns goin' off. I think I even heard a shotgun but with all that screaming--"

"You did," the cop said, making another note on her clipboard. "I don't think the guy using it'll ever be firing again. That arm got shot off." She noticed April then, closing her eyes and turning slightly away. "Oh, sorry, ma'am. Listen, either of you remember anything else, hear anything else, you let us know. You got my number, right?"

"Yeah," Casey said, nodding. "Hey, you got any idea what happened out here?"

"Probably a rival gang," she said, putting away her pen. "For being so new, the Five claws made a lot of enemies. This isn't the first gang we've seen go down like this. Ah, you two might wanna sleep somewhere else. Tonight's gonna be a real scorcher, and, well, we're not gonna be able to clean this up fast enough, if you get my drift."

"Huh?" Casey grimaced as he suddenly got it. "Oh. Eww. Yeah, we'll find a place. Maybe a motel."

"Great. Do us a favor, too, leave those lights of yours on. I'd hate to do this with a flashlight."

"Yeah, sure. Good luck an' all." When she left, he turned and put an arm around April's shoulder, letting her bury her face in his shirt. "C'mon, let's get you inside."

He took her in just as the news vans arrived and locked the door before any reporters came near. The shop looked neat and clean inside, no bullet holes or broken glass or blood. It could have been any other night, except for the flashing cameras outside. He drew the window blinds shut and turned around. And backed into the blinds with a yelp.

Michelangelo and Donatello helped April into a recliner, while Raphael pulled one of the chairs out for Splinter to sit. He beckoned Casey over, and he sat on one of the counters nearby.

"So, I guess you all saw what's left," he said.

"We saw," Don said. "From up on the roof."

"I don't get it," April said, holding tight to Mike's hand. He sat on the recliner's arm and put his arm around her shoulder. "What happened to him? The Leo I know would never have done that."

"I'm afraid I missed the warning signs," Splinter said. "I thought he was merely resting, recovering his strength. I did not realize the true extent of his injuries."

"I don't get it, Master," Mike said. "I didn't see any problems."

"Battle leaves more injuries than just the physical," Splinter said. "He acted normally for the most part, but looking back, some of the signs were so obvious."

"Hardly eating," Raph said, nodding, "sitting in the dark all the time."

"More than that," Splinter said. "A couple of days ago, I heard him practicing during the night. When he fell silent for a long time, I looked in on him. He was standing completely still, and stood that way for several hours."

"Like meditation?" Mike asked.

"Probably just caught up in a really strong memory," Don said. "Or he could've been catatonic. It's one of the symptoms of schizophrenia."

"What?" Mike gasped. "Leo's going crazy?"

"Not quite. Modern science might call it post traumatic stress disorder," Donatello said. "What it means is we have one very messed up turtle."

"But he seemed all right when I talked to him," April said. "He even snuck up on me like Mike does all the time."

"Yeah," Casey said, "when I talked to him, he was more worried about you guys. Absolutely normal."

"Until he gets into a fight," Raph said, looking at the closed windows. "Listen, he told me more about what happened to him, but I didn't wanna say anything 'cause it felt like I was betraying his confidence."

"I think he wanted you to tell us," Don said, "so he wouldn't have to. When I talked to him later, he said he wondered if you'd even listened."

"Oh I listened all right. He said he was stuck in a place like a bunch of hallways and rooms all connected, and there was no way to tell where they were. And they were constantly killing things."

"Things?" Don asked.

"He didn't go into detail, just that they were trying to kill them. Some of 'em were real small and fast, and some were so big that..." He paused a moment. "That when they killed 'em, they had to carve up the bodies to get by."

"They?" Casey asked.

"Yeah, he said there were three of them at first, him, a girl and a guy called Felix."

"Felix?" April sat straight and looked at all of them. "That's what he called the last one, the one he was...laughing with."

As she grew silent, Casey quickly explained what they had seen as the lights came out, the tall black man holding the gun to Leo's face, the sword poised at the man's throat, and then both of them relaxing as they recognized each other. All of them shivered as they thought about how close they had come to losing their brother.

"He really did all that?" Mike asked quietly. "I mean...all those bodies..."

"That wasn't all of the gang," Casey said. "I think they shot each other up by accident, but some of them, yeah. That's Leo's doing."

"This Felix," Splinter said, "what did he look like?"

"Big black guy with dreadlocks," Casey said, "And I mean big. Like, he wasn't no George Foreman, but I wouldn't wanna meet him in an alley."

"He was wearing old army fatigues," she said. "The kind they sell at surplus stores. And...he was drenched."

"'Cause of the rain?" Mike asked.

She shook her head, and he didn't ask again.

"They took off when the sirens started," Casey said. "I dunno where they went."

While they considered their options, Donatello opened his satchel and dug out his shell communicator. He flipped it open and brought up the screen. Four red dots blinked on the grid, three together and one several blocks away.

"I think I can find him," Don said. "He forgot about the tracer in all of these. We can follow him that way."

"And then what?" Raph said. "'Hey Leo, we think you're goin' nuts, come home and let us lock you up for awhile'?"

"Uh..."

"He must be brought home," Splinter said, "not to lock him up, but to help him recover. And also to keep him separate from his new friend. If Leonardo managed that massacre outside, I shudder to think what two of them might do together."

"We'd better get going," Raph said. "Mike, you and Don come with me. April, if you an' Casey wanna stay at our place for awhile--"  
Casey glanced at April who still had a sick look on her face. "That's probably the best idea. Lemme just get some things."

As they stood to head off in their different directions, Splinter put one hand on Raphael's arm, holding him back for a moment. He spoke in a low voice for him alone. "Be cautious when you find him. Try to avoid a fight."

"Yes, master. I don't wanna hurt him."

Splinter shook his head with a sigh. "This has been hard on all of us, but you especially. Without Leonardo, you have been a rock for your brothers and I. Whatever happens tonight, know that I am proud of you."

It didn't take the weight of responsibility off, but it helped Raphael shoulder it a little easier. He smiled and nodded. "I'll bring him back, master. I promise."

With no real place to go and in no hurry to decide, two figures walked through the alleys and sidestreets, keeping to the dark blocks with few streetlamps. Felix had his hands in his pockets, his knife safely clipped to his belt. Leonardo walked with his arms crossed, head down. He'd take one sheath off his back and strapped it to his waist so he could draw easily. Neither of them noticed the amount of blood still caught in their clothes. They were used to much more.

"--found out they'd listed me as missing," Felix said. "I could've gone back to work, but after all that, you don't just sit down like nothing's happened."

"So, the white claws?  
"I could do a little fighting. Took out a couple smaller gangs, make enough money to pay my back rent. You?"

Leo shook his head. "Just a lot sitting in the dark. I don't trust light anymore."

"Yeah...one of the better reasons about the claws. They did all their work at night."

A lamp stood on the corner so they turned down into an alley and continued, slowly coming out of the rain. Not far ahead they heard whispers suddenly stop, but they kept going past the garbage cans and dumpsters. Two figures on the left, three on the right, and reflected moonlight on the edges of their knives. There was a hiss of metal and a snap of a clip being popped open. In the silence, without constant howls and screams, Leonardo noticed that he could hear the skin being cut open, hear the gurgle of a slashed throat and the thud of someone hitting the floor. Blood pumping out of severed arteries sounded like the stream in the lair, fingers scratching useless at the pavement like rats.

No screams. A minute later they came out on the sidewalk, Leo sliding his sword back and Felix putting his knife back on his belt.

"I don't think I'll find another gang, though," Felix said. "I think I can handle working again. Start slow, no rush."

"Lucky," Leo said. "Master put me back to work almost immediately. Dealing with the claws was my first task."

"That O'Neil woman, she your friend? Stubborn chick."

"When you've got four ninjas to back you up..."

Felix laughed, a deep laugh that rumbled in his chest. "Mutant ninja turtles," he said, tasting the words. "All the weird things I saw in the army, you definitely take first prize, man."

"Teenage," Leo added. "I'm only sixteen."

"Sixteen? No shit? No offense, but it's hard to tell."

Leo shrugged and smirked. "No problem. All you humans look the same to me, too."

Felix looked at him, then laughed again. "Fair enough. C'mon, I know a little hole in the wall that serves 'till dawn. Should be dark enough for you."

With a nod, Leonardo followed him, arms crossed again, head down. The wind, cool and brisk, blew a newspaper page by them, and the rain rushed down the gutters. Somewhere in the distance a night club created a steady, faint beat, as if New York itself was alive, and all her demons walking her streets.

TBC...


	7. 7

****

Part 7

"I don't get it," Mike said, running behind Raphael, who ran behind Donatello. "Why are we going all over the place instead of right to him?"

They passed through an alley and paused at the opening, scanning for humans before crossing the street and running down another alley, splashing through cold puddles.

"'Cause they have a heck of a jump start on us," Raph said. "I wanna know if they did anything in the last couple of hours besides take a walk."

"I guess it's not worth wondering if we could just ask him?"

"Mike, at this point, I wouldn't trust him to tell me which way is up." Raphael noticed a familiar cracked wall next to a torn rave poster and called ahead, "hey Don, are we going in circles?"

"I'm just following the tracer's motion logs," Donatello said. "It can tell me which direction to go, but not how many times they went. If they circled this place five times, we're gonna go around five times."

"Why would they go in circles?" Mike asked.

Raph shook his head. "I dunno. Maybe they didn't notice what they were doing. If Leo can stand daydreaming in spot for hours, then I wouldn't be surprised if two of 'em can go in circles."

"Aw, man." As they stopped at the same alley opening, Mike leaned against the wall and breathed hard. "I know, why don't I wait here and wait for you guys to do all the circles? No sense in all of us getting out of breath--yikes!" He stumbled along as Raphael grabbed his shell and yanked him backwards for a few yards.

"Not in the mood," Raph said.

"Man, you're no fun. Leo wouldn't have done that."

Don glanced over his shoulder for a moment. "I don't think we guess what Leo will do anymo--whooa!" He tripped and struck the pavement with his shoulder, skimming on his shell for a few feet. He came to a stop against the wall and sat up, rubbing the back of his head as he checked his tracking device. "Nothing broken," he said. "What did I trip over?"

Hard to see in the darkness, Raphael knelt and looked closely at a lump on the ground. He dug the tip of his sai underneath it and gingerly raised it a few inches. Beetles and roaches scuttled out, but the smell and shape told him enough. "Not what, Don. Who."

"Oh...God..." Don scrambled to his feet and turned away, but he saw a second body in front of him. "There's another one."

"I've got like three more back here," Mike said, edging towards Raphael. "I think. They're all tangled up. Did Leo...?"

"Check out the cut," Raph said, tilting the body so that the head fell back, her neck nearly cut in half. A long knife tumbled out of her blue fingers. "They must've tried to jump them and never knew what hit 'em." He looked up at Donatello, now leaning on the opposite wall with his head turned away. Raph sighed and stood up. "C'mon, let's keep going. He can't have gone in circles all night."

There was no joke from Mike, no comment from Donatello. Instead they ran quietly next to him, unwilling to run ahead or behind.

The bar was one large room with a countertop running down half of it and a handful of tables in the back, old, peeling pictures of Manhattan on the walls, and over the bar, a huge unfurled American flag. In the back corner of the bar, where the light refused to come and next to the rear exit, Felix and Leonardo sat with their backs to the wall. Although the bar was crowded, no one paid any attention to them, too focused on a basketball game on the television. A cheer went up as New York scored a three point penalty shot and another round was sent off. Felix leaned back and put one leg up on the extra chair, one hand holding a glass.

Leonardo watched the humans interact, finding some like Casey, some like April. A few acted like Raph, a bit too eager to argue and tumble, and a few like himself, arguing with the Raphs. If someone came in through the front, they were welcomed into the circle and somehow a beer fast found its way into his or her hand. If it was a her, faster.

"They're mostly soldiers," Felix said, nodding at the crowd. "You can tell by the haircuts."

"All short?"

"Yup. Your hair only gets long if you're out in the field awhile. Even the girls get it short."

As cool as the night was, the bar itself was warm. Leo closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair. His own glass stood empty on the table and the alcohol was slowly working through him, letting him relax and listen to the drone of the crowd and the occasional car passing outside. New York scored again. Cheers. The door opened, someone came in, someone had to go.

"I see why you like it here," Leo said.

Felix nodded once. "It's alive. For a little while, you can let it go."

So many things he couldn't let go, responsibilities heaped on him. Raphael. Michelangelo. Donatello. Splinter. April. Casey. Raphael could go out with Casey and live. Michelangelo had discovered stories and poetry and spending time with big sister April. Donatello had his lab and inventions. Splinter devoted himself to meditation and philosophy. All he had for himself were a few sketches, military history, and defending his family. Was it so hard to see that his room was nearly empty? That his katas had turned fierce?

"Y'ever think about her?" Felix asked.

"All the time." Leo shook his head and remembered her slack face as she passed out. "She didn't deserve to go like that."

"I can't stand thinking he's still alive. Unpunished."

Leonardo opened his eyes and looked at him, realizing what he meant. "I remember you saying we ought to leave him to God."

"I did. Never said how God might handle it."

A bitter laugh, devoid of humor. "Okay," Leo said, considering." You think he's still there?"

"Probably. You think he knows we got out?"

"I'm sure he does." Leo took a deep breath and sat straight. "We're faster than we were three months ago. We could probably do it."

They sat silent for several minutes, either staring into a glass or staring into nothing. The game was coming to its last minute, dragged out by a final time out and several more penalty shots. The bar went quiet as everyone waited.  
"Let's do it now," Felix said, "before the beer wears off and I wise up."

"All right," Leo whispered to himself. "All right. But first I need to get a couple things from home."

Felix finished his drink and nodded once. "Same here. I want a little more than a knife when I face him. Put a couple affairs in order just in case. The warehouse one hour from now?"

"Works for me."

New York scored, won. As the crowd cheered and bought another round, they left through the back door and walked into the night, walking in different directions.

Fifteen minutes later, three turtles came to a stop on the roof. Mike looked over the ledge at the soldiers walking out. "Uh, I don't think he's in here, guys."

"Not anymore," Don said, pushing a few buttons on his device. "But he was for a good half hour at least. The signal's still a little strong."

"Oh geez," Mike said, "do you think he was seen?"

Raph shook his head and scanned the streets in all directions. "I don't think so. There's no yelling or nothing." He took a moment to catch his breath. They'd been running for the better part of an hour. As much as he wanted a look inside to see what had interested Leo, there was no time. "Okay, now which way?"

"East," Don said, and they followed him off the building back down to the street. They ran for a few seconds but bumped into Donatello as he abruptly stopped. All of them went down in a tangle.

"Oww..." Mike groaned. "Why'd you stop like that?"

"Hang on..." Donatello fought to get his hands free and picked up the device from where it had fallen. "He's still going straight, but the signal's fainter now. Like there's interference."

"Is he too far away?" Raph asked, kicking Mike off of him.

"No, the signal should be easy to pick up in this radius. Something has to be blocking it." As he struggled back to his feet, he noticed a sewer access close by, nestled just inside an alley. "I think he's underground. That's what's making the signal faint."

"Underground?" Mike followed his look to the access panels. "But that means he's going home. That's good, right?"

"Maybe," Raph said. "All right, we're following him, but remember, there's no way to tell what he might do. Especially with April and Casey heading that way, too."

"Wait a minute," Don said, changing features on his tracker. They heard a high pitched beep and then Splinter's face appeared on the screen. "Master Splinter, are you all still at April's place?"

"Yes. She is still packing--"

Casey's voice came from somewhere behind him. "A toolbox? Why do we gotta pack a toolbox?"

"Look," April yelled back, "I'm not coming back for a few days and I don't want to forget anything."

"But you can borrow Donny's--"

"I am taking my toolbox and that's final!"

Splinter sighed and glanced over his shoulder in time to duck a flying pillow. "They are arguing again, but I think that is preferable to her crying."

On the street, Raphael looked over Donatello's shoulder. "Master, we think Leo's headed back home. It might be a good idea if you keep April and Casey there at the shop for a little bit longer. I don't wanna chance them being there with Leo acting like this."

"I agree. Raphael, you look shaken. Has anything happened?"

Raph nodded once, even though he felt like he was tattling on his brother. "Yes, master. We found a few more bodies. I think they attacked Leo and Felix, and...it was just like in front of the shop."

"...I understand. Be careful when you see him. Though he is your brother, I am beginning to fear for your own safety."

"Yes, master." Raphael stood back as Donatello switched back to the tracking function. As they walked to the sewer access, Raph laughed once, head lowered.

"What's up?" Mike asked.

"I was just thinking. I used to hate it when Leo ratted on me, and now here I am ratting on him."

A steady drip of water somewhere in the lair was the only noise as he entered. Leonardo left the lights off as he headed to his room, heading to the table in the back. He knelt before it and raised the top, revealing a large compartment filled with his few personal effects. Everything else in his room came from Splinter, his leftover bookshelf and small tables, a few paper lanterns, and weapons he occasionally practiced with in his large, empty room. But here he kept the several art books he'd managed to get his hands on, trade collections of comics, including the Dark Phoenix Saga, Sandman: The Wake, and Watchmen.

And sketches, dozens of sketches. His brothers, April, Casey, Splinter, the bridge over the stream. The arc of a sword through the air. Several moonlit skylines of Manhattan, some before, some after. And lady liberty in the bay. She was one of his favorite subjects, judging by the sheer number of drawings, sometimes in stark black lines, sometimes in impressionistic rays of light. Sometimes nothing more than a silhouette holding a light in the dark.

He put the sketches aside. This table also held dozens of smoke grenades and flash bombs that Donatello had made for him, and small bottles of poison. He packed away several grenades and bombs, then took off his sheaths and set his swords out. He opened a bottle of cyanide and poured in enough to coat the inside, then resheathed the swords.

Task done, he turned and left, forgetting the table as he focused on meeting Felix and exacting their revenge. He walked out of his room and leaped to the ground, landing on all fours and slowly rising. Before he stood straight, he realized he wasn't alone.

"Raphael..." he said, looking up. The lights came on, momentarily blinding him. He turned his head away until he could bear it and found Michelangelo and Donatello flanking Raphael, standing between him and the door.

"Leonardo," Raph said, nodding once. "Going somewhere?"

"Out of my way."

"Can't do that," Raph said.

"Sure you can. Just step aside."

"Leo, you've killed people. People that didn't need to die."

A short laugh of amusement. "If I didn't kill them tonight, they'd come back again. I ended the problem. Besides, I didn't kill all of them."

"Did you see what you left behind?" Raph growled. "There was blood everywhere, cut up bodies--"

"I left a mess, is that what you're upset about?" Leo started laughing, ignoring how Mike and Don cringed at the sound. "Sorry, next time I'll clean up."

"Leo--"

"No. Swords aren't made for lovetaps. If you can't handle a real battlefield, then get rid of your sais and hide with April. Now get out of my way."

"I can't let you leave. Splinter wants you stay here."

"To hell with him. He survived this long without me, he can damn well do without me again."

Raphael's hand went to his sai. Beside him, Mike and Don did the same. Leonardo watched them and started to smile.

"You saw what I did to the white claws and you still want to fight me?"

Raphael showed no emotion. "If you're willing to do that to us, then I definitely can't let you go."

For a moment, Leo was almost proud of him. Sure, Raph had his brothers for backup, but Leo was sure that even without them, he'd still fight. And he wasn't lunging straight at him, he was staying calm and calculating his next move. He'd come so far in three months. They all had.

"You made one mistake," he said.

"Oh yeah?" Mike said, rising to the bait when Raph wouldn't.

"Yeah." Leo dropped into a fighting stance, breathing shallow. "You should have hit me when the lights came on."

And then he lunged.

TBC...


	8. 8

****

Part 8

Feinting towards Raph, Leo instead ducked his punch and tackled Michelangelo, throwing both of them to the ground, but Leo's fall was cushioned and Mike had the breath knocked out of him. Leo dodged right and narrowly avoided Donatello's bo, backflipping further down into the main room. Raphael followed, his sais flashing in the light. Leonardo winced as the glare hit his eyes and backed away again.

"It doesn't have to be like this," Raph said. His slashes weren't aimed to hit, only drive back. "I don't wanna fight you!"

"Could of fooled me," Leo said. He backed into the wall and his hands scrabbled along the wall, and out of luck he grabbed his old sheaths, empty but still heavy. He hurled them at Raphael and darted towards him, heading for his legs.

Raphael veered left to dodge but couldn't react in time as Leo rushed forward. He stepped back, thinking his brother meant to break his legs, but instead Leo halted and swept him off his feet. As he landed hard on his back, Leo moved past him as quick as a shadow, attacking Donatello.

He had to stay out of the reach of that bo. Solid oak, Donatello's staff was heavy enough to shatter bones and Don was fast enough to whip it 180 degrees without pausing. It whistled through the air as his brother put more and more strength into his swings, growing frustrated as he couldn't hit him. Every time he struck, Leo had already moved out of the way.

The staff swung in a powerful arc towards Leo's head, too powerful as Donatello missed and the force of his swing sent him off balance, stumbling to the right. Leonardo kicked his wrist, knocking the staff out of his hands. Before it hit the ground, Leo had bent and grabbed it, jabbing Don in the chest. His brother fell backwards so Leo didn't see the nunchuck whipping towards him until he could barely block it, catching the end with the staff. The crack of wood echoed through the lair, and Leo looked into Mike's eyes. All the laughter and levity had gone out of them, leaving him intent on bringing his sibling down. That Mike had turned on him didn't surprise him. That it hurt, did.

But Felix was waiting.

Leonardo drove forward, taking a hit on his upper arm as he knocked the staff against Mike's head, then his leg, his knee, his arm, raining blows down as fast as he could. The staff started to blur as Mike cried out, turning away and falling to his knees. Without a break, Leo jammed the staff backward, missing Raphael behind him but using the position to smack Raph's side, then wrist. With a turn of his arm, he spun the staff, striking the top of Raph's head, and flicked it sideways, hitting Donatello's shoulder. As they winced, he knelt again and used all of his strength to drag the bo in a circle above the ground, knocking them over again.

He stood amongst his fallen brothers, not even breathing hard. He sighed and tossed the staff on the floor, listening to it roll away. The flow, the ecstasy, the rhythm of the fight, none of it in this. He felt no elation in victory, no heady rush without blood or screams. He closed his eyes and tilted his head back, breathing deep.

"Did it give you pleasure," he asked the air, "to watch me defeat them?"

"No."

Leo glanced over his shoulder at the rat in the doorway. Tail tip flipping, Splinter leaned on a cane and watched him. "Then why didn't you help them?"

"I had hoped you would not make that necessary." Splinter stepped closer, stopping in arm's reach of his oldest son. "I thought I could trust you that much. Have you really changed so much?"

"I haven't changed at all." Leo turned and looked down at his master. "You trained me to kill. You taught me how to take life."

"Only when needed," Splinter shook his head, "only to defend yourself."

"Have bullets become less lethal while I was gone?" Leo's hands flexed, eager to take up his swords. "Have knives lost their edge?"

"So much blood you shed--"

A bitter laugh as Leo stared at him in amazement. "Again with the blood? Is that all that upset you? Would you feel better if I'd snapped their necks instead? They'd still be dead. Why do you make me fight but never let me kill? I study war but you never let me wage war. Are our lives worth less than theirs?"

"Leonardo, we cannot make ourselves executioners. Your studies are to help you avoid death on either side."

Leo closed his eyes and looked down. The relief from the light bolstered him. "It is criminal," he recited, "to teach a man not to defend himself when he is the victim of constant attack." He looked back at his master. "I've studied more than war. Military history is all of history."

"And what has history taught you?" Splinter said, tightening his grip on his cane.

"Two things," Leo said. "Whether death is evil depends on who's telling the story."

"And the second?"

"That you're stalling so that they'll recover and help stop me." Leo took a step forward, using it to leap as Splinter swung his cane towards his face. He narrowly missed the edge and landed behind him, rolling under the next swipe and standing straight. "Use Raphael from now on. I'm done listening to you."

"Leonardo, three months of constant fighting has traumatized your mind," Splinter said, holding his hand out. "Let us help you."

Leo backed away as if he were a viper. "Raphael can carry the weight from now on. I'm sick of it. I'm sick of bearing it all. I'm sick of you!" His hand went back and grabbed the hilt of his sword, drawing it out. Splinter froze as a drop of liquid glittered in the light and fell to the floor. There was no doubt as to what it was. He backed away, raising his cane in defense. Leo's sword slashed past him and cut through the exposed wiring along the wall. There was a flash and then the lair went dark.

At first Splinter wondered why he'd done that. They all knew how to fight in the dark, this was hardly an advantage for him. Then the fight started again, and he blocked a swing to his face. Wood cracked again, and he realized Leonardo must have retrieved Donatello's staff. He blocked another hit, then another, and then they came too fast to block. The hit that took him down was not as powerful as it could have been, only knocking him off balance rather than breaking bone. He heard other hits in the darkness and Raphael grunting in pain. He must have tried to attack his brother as the lights came down.

"Dammit, Leo, what the hell--?" Raph cried out again.

"You don't get it, do you?" Leo swung the staff with all his strength, managing to send Raph rolling on the ground. "You have to concentrate to fight in the dark. But for me, this is home."

Splinter rubbed the back of his head as a bruise swelled. Leonardo was far too accurate in the dark to be using the methods Splinter taught. The dim glow of the televisions on standby, the faint light from Donatello's aquarium upstairs, was that really all the light Leonardo needed, or could even stand?

For several seconds the lair was silent. He heard Donatello grumbling as he headed to the television center, splashing through the stream that he couldn't see. Then a lamp came on, and other lights soon followed until the lair was lit again.

One of them, Michelangelo, helped him to his feet. Raphael was on his hands and knees, pushing himself up. Donatello leaned against one of the support columns, holding his head and wincing. Leonardo was gone.

"Damn," Raph hissed, "I can't believe how fast he is."

"I couldn't even touch him," Don said, sitting down on the circular ledge. "And then when he got my staff..."

"Donnie," Raph said, "can you still--?"

"Already checking." Donatello had his tracking device out and a little green dot blinked on the screen. "Yup. He still doesn't know about it. Question is, do we want to go after him?"

"And get thrashed again?" Mike asked, helping Splinter into a chair. "No way, man. I didn't like the first course, I'm not asking for seconds."

"But you were not 'thrashed'," Splinter said. "Look at yourselves. For all your bruises, are any of them truly painful?"

The three of them considered, looking themselves over. No cuts, no scrapes, only small bruises and a few friction burns.

"He did not use his swords," Splinter said. "Only a staff. He held himself back."

"Wait a second," Raph said, deep in thought. "The last time I fought him, it was the same. Really fast, but also pretty light. And the white claws, those were all quick strikes."

Mike grimaced. "You looked? Geez, Raph..."

"What I mean is, he only used his swords. He didn't try punching or kicking. And he wasn't even scratched. With all those bullets flying, he had to be moving pretty fast."

"So," Don said. "He's fast, we already know that."

"I think I understand your meaning," Splinter said. "He must be fast because that is all he has. He may have held back in regard to his swords, but he had no choice in holding back his strength. He is not as strong as he once was."

"Really?" Mike asked. "How come?"

"Doesn't matter right now. We can wear him down," Raph said. "If he has to keep moving, the three of us can bring him down."

"Enough," Splinter said. "He has a head start already. Go and bring him back." He put his hand on Raphael's arm before he could follow his brothers out and said in a low voice, for him only, "but you must beware his swords. I believe they are poisoned."

"What?" Raph's eyes widened. "Aw man..."

"Keep your brothers safe," Splinter said. "I know it is hard, but you must do it."

"I know, master. I will." With a final nod, Raphael ran after his brothers and caught up, vanishing with them into the sewers.

Left behind to wait for Casey and April, Splinter rose from his chair and made his way up to their rooms, passing by Donatello's room, glowing with strange experiments, then Raphael's, cluttered like a personal gym, and then into Leonardo's, nearly empty but for a few tables and shelves. The only decorations were displays of ancient weaponry and banners, paper lanterns and...he spotted the table in the back, left open with a few pages slipping out.

He crossed the room and knelt before it, gathering up sketch after sketch. There must have been dozens. He gazed on them less in admiration for the skill that rendered them and more in amazement. Leonardo had never shown any interest in art, never voiced an appreciation of the paintings and sculptures April sold. Hidden amongst the shop's odds and ends, she had several local artists in her supply and replicas of masters from all over the world. If Leonardo had ever stopped to look, they'd never seen him.

Each sketch was done in black pencil, but they varied in rendering. He could tell the earliest ones by their amateurish approach, but as he progressed, he saw improvement, begiinning with basic exercises in perspective and composition and moving through his family, their few friends. One by one he examined them, for the first time seeing the world the way Leonardo saw it. Halfway through, he noticed the art books nestled in the table corner and took them out, opening them and flipping through the pages.

Several were dog-eared with notes in the margins, Leonardo's favorites he assumed, and even after the cursory glance at the sketches, he recognized some of the styles used. The blood on the slicing sword came from Gentileschi's Judith. Donatello looking up as if startled from his workbench was Zurbaran's St. Francis. April and Casey asleep in bed together, but lying as if they could never get close enough. A page number on the sketch gave him Kokoshka's Bride of the Wind, with all the agitation of the oil paint rendered in pencil. Donatello's Mary Magdalene, and he dug out one of the sketches of Lady Liberty, shown just as angular as the saint.

Picasso's Guernica. Bosch's Hell. Splinter frowned. Michelangelo's Last Judgment. There were no peaceful works chosen, no landscapes or Rococo women. No portraits without shadows, no smiles without hidden meaning, and the sketches were the same. Manhattan's skyline was wounded and bleeding, lady liberty righteous and burning. After just a look at these selections, he wondered if his Leonardo would paint a Mona Lisa with an angry glare. Angry, all of it. A terrible thought gripped him, and he flipped quickly through the sketches, through dark outlines of the family, and when he didn't find it he looked back inside the table. He found himself buried underneath the poison.

His portrait glared out of sfumato shadows with all the malevolence of Goya's Cronos, as if he were in the process of devouring his sons.

Splinter leaned back and let the page slip from his hand. Leonardo had said he hadn't changed. Then what was this now? Anger let free? That couldn't be all of it, he reasoned, there had been no rage in his voice when they first spoke, no cruelty in his conversations with his brothers. What had changed in those first couple of days?

Weight.

"Leonardo," he whispered, "what have we done to you?"

TBC...

Notes: (It is criminal to teach a man not to defend himself when he is the victim of constant attack. -- Malcolm X)

At my website, you can find all of the paintings mentioned in case you wanted to see but didn't want to google.

I appreciate all the reviews. They're what's making me write faster.


	9. 9

****

Part 9

Through the sewers, through the streets, running as if he wasn't allowed to stop, Leonardo made his way to the docks. Of everything he'd done, seeing that look in Mike's eyes hurt the most. They all believed he was insane, traumatized, hateful. Splinter had frozen when he saw the poison. His hurt turned to anger. After years, a lifetime of protecting them, they all thought he would hurt them? Kill them? He leaped onto a closed dumpster and up to a fire escape, forcing himself to stop at the roof and catch his breath.

Burned. Every bridge was burned now. He frowned. No, there was still April and Casey, but after seeing the massacre and then with what his brothers would tell them, they would be gone, too. He stepped across the roof and leaned on the ledge, looking down at the street where the light colored everything gold. Free. No brothers to protect, to defend, to live for. No more fighting them to get them to practice, to train, to take just a little of that weight off of his back. No more answering to Master Splinter.

No more Mario Kart with Mike. No more play fighting with Raph. He couldn't serve as an extra pair of hands for Donatello, wouldn't be asked to help move the heaviest equipment. No more chess with Splinter. He winced. His books and sketches were still in the lair. No matter. He reached into the back of his belt and pulled out a polaroid. He doubted they'd noticed it was gone yet. Just before leaving, he'd nabbed it from its frame.

Startled from his game, Mike looked up at the camera while Raphael took the second controller to victory, yelling as he passed the finish line. Behind them, Splinter meditated near the bridge and Donatello attacked one of his latest machines with a screwdriver. Since Leo'd taken the picture, he wasn't in it.

He slipped the picture back. The night wasn't half over yet and so much had happened. He took a deep breath and leaped off the ledge, landing on the light post and leaping to the pavement. All alone, he ran through the dark, his own breathing loud in his ears. After a few minutes he came to the warehouse, a dilapidated building set on a dock. The ocean lapped against the concrete barriers.

Three months ago he met Felix on the roof, both of them lured by the strange lights and sounds, though for different reasons. Tonight he met him there again, crouching behind a security camera. Felix saw him approach and nodded, but stayed quiet. His knife was still clipped to his belt but instead he unholstered a large semi-automatic. Leonardo drew one sword. Once again there was no light but they moved just the same. A slash sent the security camera flying as they ran for skylight, and an explosion sent the shattering glass raining down into the building. A grenade, Leo figured.

He went through the skylight first, avoiding the sharp edges and free falling several feet before he caught one of the metal rafters and making his way into the darkness. Behind him, he heard Felix do the same. There was a startled yell beneath them and the hum of machinery. A moment later, he reached the wall and the large crates stacked like a pyramid. He came down quickly, drawing his other sword as soon as he hit the floor.

Light filled the warehouse like a trapped sun and burned his eyes. Somewhere over his own scream he heard Felix cry out and he fell to one knee. The entire world turned white. Even as he scrambled to cover his eyes, he heard the laughter start.

"I thought you'd be back. Come to play the game again? Come to run my maze?"

"Keep talking," Leo whispered, standing straight. Louder, he answered. "Come to kill you." He heard the electric whine of Stockman's chair as he wheeled somewhere to his left.

"Of course." Stockman lowered the lights back to normal and wheeled back to the large computer screen against the wall. The damage was done, and he doubted either of them could see anymore. Didn't make them any less dangerous, though, and he watched them reorient themselves, focusing on his movements as he tapped in a sequence on his computer. "You should know you two were the first to complete the game. No one's even made it to the fifth level besides you."

"No one's survived the fourth level, you mean," Felix said. He blindly put aside the gun and took out the knife, heading towards his enemy's voice.

"Well..." Stockman glanced back at the screen. Several dots appeared in a maze of halls, all of them black but one. One white dot occasionally moved from room to room. "Not quite. The female specimen is surviving, but I don't think she'll make it past this level."

"What?" Leo blinked hard, trying to force his sight to return. All he could make out where white blurs on a white background. "She's alive?"

"Did you think she was dead?" Stockman's voice was genuinely surprised and he picked up a clipboard, flipping the pages over. "This is what happens when you can't communicate with your subjects, just one mistake after another. I was so sure it was a psychological survival regression. Since you're here, I'd better ask what effects you've felt since esca--"

Loud bursts interrupted him, following by thick black smoke that crawled across the floor and filled the warehouse. Leonardo tossed all of them, chocking the air and evening the playing field. He sensed Felix running past him and heard the clang of metal striking metal, the knife coming up against all of Stockman's cybernetic parts and searching for flesh and bone.

The blindness was slowly wearing off but not fast enough. He slipped out a handful of shuriken and focused on the sources of light he could make out. When he found one, he hurled the shards of metal into the air. A satisfying crash later, the warehouse turned a little darker. The next target was easier, and now the darkness rushed back in.

He still couldn't see well but without light to hamper him, the pain went away and the shapes came back. He tightened his grip on his swords and headed through the smoke for the fight. Careful to avoid Felix, he slashed low to the ground, aiming for the motors running the chair. Instead of meeting metal, a bolt of electricity ran up the sword through his arm, sending him stumbling back even as he brought his other sword to bear, this time gritting his teeth through the jolt. Something sputtered and ground to a halt, and the electricity pulsing through the sword suddenly stopped.

"Finally!" Felix yelled, now slashing freely.

"Don't celebrate yet," Stockman growled, hard pressed to maneuver his chair out of range. Out of sight, his hand flew across a keypad built into the chair. "I sent you there once..."

As he struggled to find his target, let alone hit him, Leo briefly wondered if there was a way to rescue Chanta, somehow draw her out of the game without letting anything else loose. Donatello could probably figure out the controls. Maybe he'd even wait long enough for him to explain before attacking him.

The smoke started to clear at the same time the blurs became Stockman and Felix. With a triumphant yell he dove forward, sending his sword straight towards Stockman's heart, plunging through the layers of wiring and circuit cards--

And then another flash, smaller but still too bright, blinded him again. His eyes couldn't take the second strike and he turned away, collapsing as he pressed his hands to his face. For a moment he was sure his eyes were bleeding, but it was only the blood of his earlier kills dampening his hands.

"Leo!"

"Dude, it's Stockman!"

Leonardo almost laughed. "How the hell do you keep finding me?" he whispered. He felt one of them put their hands on his shoulders and he drew away as if burned, swiping blindly with his sword. Instantly his brother backed up out of range. He scrambled to his feet and blinked rapidly. The blurs dispelled faster this time, and a green blur with a red streak across the face stood in front of him.

"How many times do I have to fight you?" he hissed. Behind his brother, Mike stood guard over Felix as Donatello fended Stockman off.

"Until you come home," Raph said.

"I'm never going back," Leo said, backing away from his brother's outstretched hand. "I finish this fight and that's it. I will never see you again."

"Like hell," Raph said. "We'll finish this fight and then I'm taking you home if I have to drag--"

Stockman's yell stole their attention. With a final entry of a code, he activated one of the many machines in the warehouse. Two electrodes pointing at each other in the middle of the building lit with blue crackling energy, heating so that they glowed white. A familiar tingle shot through Leonardo's body and he staggered, suddenly dizzy. Finally, here it came, too strong to fight, and he willingly surrendered to the sensation of being pulled in all directions.

Suddenly Raphael's arms were around him again, steadying him, and he couldn't push him away without raising his swords. "Let me go," he said, desperately trying to get out of his grip.

"Never."

"You don't understand," Leo yelled, but too late. The light went away, the electrode's hum faded and Donatello's surprised cry disappeared, replaced by the skittering of claws nearby and the distant howls of strange creatures.

Raphael stepped back and looked around. He imagined they must be in a small room, but he couldn't see anything. As his eyes adjusted, dilating as far as possible, he could make out a faint glow from the floor, like luminescent webs. He bent to examine them but stopped as his brother spoke.

"Don't touch them," Leo whispered. "They burn. And they go dark if touched."

"Where are we?" Raph asked, already knowing.

"In the game." Leonardo put one of his swords in its sheath and readjusted his grip on the other. "How well can you see?"

"Not too good. I can barely see you."

"That'll change." He walked to the door he could see and listened for anything outside, then slowly opened it a crack. All clear. He pushed it open and turned back to his brother. "Follow me. Felix must be close by."

"Wait," Raph said, touching his shoulder. "How did we get here? Where are we?"

"I don't know, and I don't know," Leo said. "It's just the game. Kill anything that isn't one of us. Stay quiet. Keep close. At the end of the last level is something like what sent us here. It'll take us back."

"What do you mean, level?"

Leo sighed impatiently but forced himself to continue. "I don't know what level we're on yet. As you go, you might find a staircase. We keep going up until we hit the roof."

"Wait a second--"

"That's all I know," Leo snapped. "Now keep up. I'm not carrying you."

"Oh, can it already," Raphael growled. "All this attitude 'cause you got tired of being in charge? And you say I'm selfish--"

"Selfish...?" Leo put one hand around his throat and pushed him against the wall, holding him there. "I've spent the last fifteen years carrying you three so you could have your own lives. Fifteen years of nothing but training and practice and trying to get you three to practice so I didn't have to babysit you in a fight. In charge? I was nothing but your slave!"

Raphael grabbed his brother's wrist and tightened his grip, easily throwing him off. In a straight fight, his sibling was nowhere near as strong as he once was. "You could've said something, anything."

Leo stood still for several seconds, silent. The scrape of claws was still far away. "I did," he whispered.

"What?" Raphael blinked. "When? I don't...remember..."

"Not to you." Leo closed his eyes and let the memory play itself out again. It was easy, he'd recalled it many times. "It is the responsibility of the eldest," he said, "to sacrifice for the family. I know it is hard, but you must bear up under the weight. I am entrusting your brothers' safety to you."

Raph didn't have to ask who said that. He lowered his head. "I'm sorry. I didn't know."

"It doesn't matter anymore." He took a deep breath and checked the hall again. Still empty. "Now let's find Felix and start our run."

Silent, Raphael followed.

Inside Stockman's lab, Donatello looked wildly around the warehouse, but his brothers and Felix were gone. The electrodes dimmed and shut off, and behind him, four new white dots appeared on the screen. He turned and saw them, paired off in adjoining rooms. "What the heck?" He brought his staff up against Stockman's head, forcing him to meet his gaze. "What did you do? Where are they?"

"My very own pocket dimension," Stockman said, his voice raspy and faint. Circuits sparked inside the gashes in his cybernetics. "Where my mousers failed, my breeders will succeed."

"What?" Donatello watched as Stockman's head lolled forward and his eyes lost their focus. When he didn't hear any breathing, he leaned closer and put his hand on the man's throat. No pulse. Unnerved, he drew back but glanced at the wound in his chest area. Despite the depth, the cut to the actual skin was relatively minor. He shouldn't have died from that alone. He sighed and looked back at the computer.

"What did you mean?" He picked up the clipboard and flipped the pages back. Schematics and theories on the collapsibility of space stood side by side with detailed analysis of bioluminescence and genetic extraction. And then he found the sketches of Stockman's breeders.

Completely albino, meant to thrive in darkness, they were built like crosses between humans and raptors. Humanoid, their hands were made of three talons each several inches long. Their feet held two talons; their mouths took up two thirds of their eyeless faces, gaping maws filled with teeth. Muscular, they looked as strong as they were fast.

The next page held a smaller creature, four legged, its body a simple mass of muscle with a mouth in the center. The way Stockman had drawn it, Donatello figured it could use its claws to grip the wall and ceiling, able to run in all directions without worrying about gravity. Were all of these creatures built only to feed and kill? No wonder Leo hardly ate anymore.

The computer beeped and he looked up. His eyes widened and the clipboard slipped out of his hands. He'd thought the black dots marked the dead subjects, but now more black ones started to appear and move en masse towards the white dots, filling the halls and rushing closer like a flood.

TBC...


	10. 10

****

Part 10

The floor was metal and cold against his face. Mike sat up, blinking fast and wondering who'd turned out the lights. As his eyes adjusted, he noticed something glowing on the floor and he crawled closer, putting his face right in front of it. It looked like veins running along the edges of the wall, and they glowed in pulses, like a heart beat. They also gave off heat, and he backed away again, too unnerved to touch it.

"No way you're Leo," came a voice, and Mike turned towards the voice, trying to see the person talking. "You breathe too loud. So who the hell are you?"

"Huh? I'm his youngest brother, Mike. Who're you?"

"Name's Felix. Guess he didn't mention me."

Mike edged away from the voice. It sounded a little like the actors playing psychos or drill sergeants on tv, only there was no hate in his voice. As Felix spoke, he figured out what it was. Felix' voice was pure anger, not irrational, not insane, just angry.

"He hasn't spoken much at all," Mike said. "Don't take it personal."

"I'm not. Get up." Felix had never let go of his knife and now he only tightened his grip. He completely ignored his gun. "You got anything sharp on you?"

"Nope, just nunchucks."

"Nunchucks...yeah, I remember those. Bruce Lee had 'em in that movie. You that good?"

"No one's as good as he was, but I'm pretty close." Mike stood up and walked closer. The light from the floor was starting to work now, and he could make out Felix's silhouette. All he'd seen before was a flash of a big black man in dreadlocks and fatigues, hardly unusual in itself, but the long knife with the wickedly serrated edge glinted in the faint light.

"I hope so, for your sake. If you're Leo's brother, maybe you fight as good as he does. Stay close, keep quiet. And for the love of God, will you stop breathing so loud?"

"Uh...okay..." Mike hadn't known he was. He slowed his breathing down and hoped that did it.

Following just a few inches behind, Mike quietly closed the door and looked around himself as much as he could. This had to be the place Raphael had described, but Leo had never mentioned the glowing veins along the floor, or the howls and screeches that echoed all around him. In the dark, all he could see were the pulsing glow and the faint outline of a corner farther ahead, turning into a new corridor.

"Oh hell," Felix whispered, and Mike looked around. A moment later, he heard the scrape of claws on metal, hungry growls, and it was coming closer.

Felix started running and Mike did his best to keep up, occasionally bumping against walls as he followed the sound of the man's feet, unable to see at all as they ran. When they reached the corner, he realized it too late and ran into the wall, turning his face aside just before he hit. Already Felix' footsteps were hard to hear over the scraping and howling. It sounded like Leonardo sharpening his swords, the high pitched screech of metal on metal, and he put his hands over his ears.

A hand fell on his shoulder and spun him around, covering his mouth before he could scream. The hand was familiar, three fingered, and he noticed the glint of a sharp edge, much longer than Felix's knife. Somehow in the darkness, Leo had found him.

"Quiet," his brother whispered. Mike thought he saw him looking back and forth down the hall, but it was hard to tell if he saw movement or just imagined it. "Raph, grab his hand and follow us."

Raphael's hand, much stronger than Leo's, took his wrist, and now he was yanked down the hall. Resentful and relieved at once, he kept his mouth shut and ran at full tilt, hoping Raphael could see their brother better than he could. Probably, since he didn't hit another wall.

The next corner they turned, they ran into the first wave, their snarls deafening. For all the dark, Mike could see the creatures enough to recognize their outlines. Big ones on two legs, small ones on four, and all of them glinting in the faint light. He wondered how they could be shining until he realized those were teeth and claws. Raph's hand disappeared as he pulled both sais, and Mike drew out his nunchucks.

After the first hit, he realized they weren't going to be enough. There wasn't enough room to generate enough force in his swing to break bones. He cracked one of the big monster's jaws, sent another spinning into the wall, but they were too resilient to be deterred by crushed bones and the little ones moved to fast to target, let alone hit. One of them skittered across the ceiling and leaped at his face, jaws wide. Mike stumbled back, too slow to do anything.

Halfway to him, it jerked in midair, all four legs flailing as it screeched. A spray of blood hit his face and he tried to wipe it off, starting to tremble as shivers ran through his body. The end of a sword held it aloft for the instant it took to kill, then slashed downward, cutting another in half even while throwing off the first one. The hall filled with the screams of the dead and dying, and then Raphael grabbed his wrist again, pulling him along. He thought they were close to a broken water pipe or a running faucet, but as he splashed through the hall he realized that the puddles weren't of water.

He closed his eyes. They were useless now anyway. The most he could do for now was run and hope he didn't slow them down. His first fight, and he'd hardly helped at all. Despite himself, he started to slow down, the chills in his body turning into nausea. Raphael yanked his hand, forcing him faster.

"They're down this way, too," Felix said somewhere ahead of him. "They're everywhere."

"We've got to get to a room," Leo said. "I think the screamers've been breeding."

"Not much else to do here," Felix said.

Mike realized they were whispering, and he only then noticed that the halls were quiet again, that the screaming had stopped. More creatures still moved down the same corridors but they were wary now, the killers had come back. He let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding. Quiet had never been so comforting.

"Or...wait," Felix said. "There weren't screamers on the bottom levels, only feeders. Maybe we're higher up."

"I hope so." They rounded the next turn and faced another batch, hacking and cutting. There weren't as many this time, and Raphael never let go of him.

The screams seemed to be louder, the scrape of metal more shrill. He could actually hear Leo's sword cutting through flesh and bone, hear Felix's knife stabbing through a stomach and ripping through the soft tissues. He pressed a hand over his mouth and hoped he wouldn't throw up. Noise, everything was noise. Was this sensory overload? Was that even possible in the dark?

"I think I see a door," Leo yelled over the screams. "Straight ahead, on the left."

And they proceeded to carve a path. The smell of blood filled the hall, and Mike wondered if it would flood like in the Kubrick movie with Jack Nicholson. What was the title? Why was he even thinking of that? Home, he wanted to go home right now. And Donatello, where was he? Was he somewhere in the dark? That staff would be useless here, no room to swing, no way to slash with it. Oh God let him be back in Stockman's lab. Dreaming, this had to be a nightmare, and the screams wouldn't stop, they beat on him worse than fists--

The screams stopped but the echoes lingered. Expecting to be pulled again, he looked up as Raphael simply held still. Felix and Leo didn't move. All he heard was blood dripping down the walls. The pulse of the luminescent webs was louder, pounding almost. After a few seconds he noticed that the pounding didn't match the webs' pulsing, and that it was coming closer. The metal floor started to vibrate.

"First demon," Leo whispered. "It's between us and the door. Mike, Raph, stay behind us."

No answer. Mike wondered if Raph was in shock, too, but the hand never loosened its grip.

And then the demon roared like seven thunders.

Felix and Leo didn't hesitate, he heard them running to cut off its attack. Mike put one hand on Raph's shoulder and drew closer. He couldn't see the web of light farther down the hall, the thing had to be blocking them with its sheer mass. And it was fast, the tremors made by its claws slamming the floor rattling the whole hallway. How could Felix use a knife against something like that?

With so little light, he only saw motion, not the shapes, but he heard them working flawlessly together, their teamwork honed over three months of constant warfare. And in this moment, knowing what awaited him if they failed, killing was a good thing. Blood flowed past them, up to his ankles, followed by his brother's joyful yell "got it's throat!"

A moment later, the floor rattled as it crashed down, a last breath rasping through its throat, and then it came to rest. Instead of stopping, his brother kept cutting, and the wet splat of blood and flesh hitting the floor told him what they were doing. It was too big to climb over. Raphael took his shoulder and led him through, helping him through the carcass, still hot and steaming in the cool air.

If there was a room down this hall like Leo had said, they didn't stop. Drunk with death, Felix and Leo continued walking, leading them down the silent corridors. The only sound was their own breathing, and he absently remembered to breathe quieter. The darkness began to swallow him.

Now he understood. The silence was worse than the screaming; this game of waiting left him empty inside, as if killing was the thing real.

Inside Stockman's warehouse, Donatello sat down on the floor, breathing a sigh of relief. The black dots were gone for now, although he wondered what was so special about the one black dot the white dots had taken so long to get around. He picked up the clipboard again and looked for an explanation.

Stockman's handwriting was worse than Raph's, and he briefly considered calling April over to help decipher the notes and methods, but he rejected that immediately. If he couldn't have it figured out before the night was out, then he'd call her, but he wanted her as far from this place as possible. If Leo and Felix had come back, then other things might be able to follow through as well.

Somehow Stockman had created his own pocket dimension. Donatello's loathing mixed with admiration. The technology was pure genius, if insane. He followed equations and theory until he decided that it wouldn't help him and flipped through the pages, searching for a fail safe function or an escape subroutine. He found it on the second to last page, detailing a way to destroy the structure within the dimension, collapsing it and killing everything inside. That would have to wait until everyone was back. He spotted the mechanism that would return them to the real world, but he groaned when it he saw it had to be operated from the inside. No remote save there.

There had to be something he could do. But as he went through the paperwork and slowly admitted that he'd have to search the computer files instead, the most he could do for now was call Splinter and tell him what had happened.

And not to expect them home today. Outside, the sun rose over the horizon, beautiful and clear.

TBC...

Notes: thank you for the wonderful reviews (especially you guys leaving paragraphs and that one really spectacularly long review. I live for those.)


	11. 11

****

Part 11

The exhilaration, the thrill of killing everything in his path and relishing their death, that he was alive and they weren't, all the joy of the game came back to him, as heady as a rich wine. His swords would never be clean again, his eyes would always look through flying blood, and there would be things to kill forever. No rules, no responsibility, no weight.

Michelangelo stumbled behind him.

The joy muted. He had to get his brothers out of here. Mike wouldn't last long in the darkness. Of his brothers, his youngest thrived on light, still played games they'd long forgotten, and couldn't stand death. Raphael was slowly adapting, but he doubted Mike would ever see in these halls.

They snuck around the next corner, surprising several feeders with a single screamer trapped in their talons, biting dripping mouthfuls from the small creature. Its screams covered their steps and heads flew before they'd turned halfway. They plopped on the floor and rolled to a stop. Arterial blood pumped from the throats as the bodies collapsed.

The screams alerted the next group of monsters early; several pockets of feeders and screamers came together and formed huge pack, cutting them off on both sides. The metallic scrape of their claws on the floor reminded him of high pitched heavy metal chords and their screeches, the roaring of death metal. Deep breath and he lunged.

Cut through a throat, blood sprayed against his arm as he followed through the head of a feeder, lopping in it half. His other sword impaled a screamer and rammed through a feeder, drawing back as he spun and slashed open a stomach, caught a leaping screamer in the air. Two halves slammed on the floor and slid to a stop against the wall. The luminescent webbing burned the skin touching it and that part of the web went dark.

Beside him, Felix slit a throat, ducked claws, drew the knife up a sternum. Whatever passed for the innards of these creatures tumbled out, the wet surfaces glistening. There should have been a smell, but the only smell was blood covering the walls and flowing by like a river roaring as loud as the demon. He cut off a screamer's leg and sliced through a feeder's side, leaving it to collapse on itself and lay on the floor, screeching as opportunistic screamers fed on it, still living.

Blood is the life, and Leo wondered how they could be covered with life and death at once. It was a minor miracle in the dark, the law of nature wrapped into a tight microcosm. Win and live, lose and die, and the rule never changed, not in this dimension or the next.

Kill.

Cut through a feeder's legs, cut off its arm arcing toward his face, cut its chest wide open. Impale a screamer, slice it midair, stab it and use the remaining edge to slice a feeder's head off, the screamer living up to their nickname for it as it spun through the air, flailing and bleeding.

Kill.

Their claws dove for his face, their teeth aimed for his throat. They were jealous of his eyes in particular. One by one, sometimes two at once, in a lucky hit three, they fell at his feet until he had to step over them. The kills weren't always clean, and many of his victims lay on the floor, quivering, racked with spasms and agonized howls as they were fed upon, until he cut apart the ones feeding on them.

Kill.

And blood began to drip from the ceiling, sent there from the sheer amount flying from his swords, from the knife, and occasionally from Raphael's sai. He was a wall between the monsters and his brothers, and blood rained down on them like baptism, born again into glorious violence and death. He was the faster monster and he served his brothers, becoming death and destroyer to protect them as they could not.

Even between Felix and Leo's swords, something occasionally made it through, near enough to take off their heads if they didn't duck. A handful of screamers leaped at once, and though he killed four, the fifth slipped around his swords, losing a leg but still on target to sink its teeth into his eyes.

A gunshot, drowned in the screaming, slammed into its mouth and sent it spinning sideways, hitting the wall. Its remaining legs curled up like a dying roach, and Leo turned to look down the hall.

Weighing less than he remembered, with torn clothes and a bloody arm, Chanta held a gun, the black metal still shining. She fired seemingly without aiming, but every bullet exploded a head or blew off a limb. Then there was a scream behind her, and she turned and fired again, now backing down the hall towards them.

Leonardo moved slightly to position himself between her and the last remaining creatures on his side, finishing the final screamer as she caught up. Without acknowledging each other, the three of them merged into a single unit, Leonardo moving at the front to wipe out anything coming at them while Felix killed anything that slipped by her bullets. Raphael kept Mike close by, between the three. In a few minutes, the halls went silent again.

"Next room," she whispered. "I gotta reload."

"Here," Felix answered, unholstering his gun. "Got a present for you. Full clip, and I got more."

"Oh," she smiled and took it, holding it in her other hand. "Manna from heaven."

A high pitched whine interrupted them, and they leaped forward, hitting the ground and remaining motionless. At the same time, Leo turned and threw his brothers to the floor, falling next to them as a bolt of light shot through the dark. He winced, but the burn was superficial.

"Damn," he whispered, looking back up. The red light near the ceiling was already fading, but it was like a beacon to him and he sent a throwing star through it, breaking glass and tearing wires. "I can see a door there, but there's probably more of 'em."

"What was that?" Raph asked, looking up.

"Lasers," Chanta answered. "If I can see them, I can take them out."

"Just a sec." Leo picked up one of his flash bombs and pulled out the detonator so it wouldn't ignite, then sent the shell rolling down the hall. There was the whine of motion detectors triggering the aiming sights, and then several bolts of light zapped through the shell, leaving it a lump of scorched plastic.

Three shots went off before the lights grew dim, and she fired on the afterimages, nailing two more. "There."

Just to be safe, Leo slid the detonator down the hall, and when nothing fired, they followed him to the door. He listened at the edge for a moment, then cracked it open. Empty. Once they were all in, he closed it and sat with his back against it. Beside him, Raphael let Mike collapse in a corner and sat next to him, one arm around his shoulder. About as large as a walk-in closet, several shelves were built into the wall, and these were mostly empty save for a few small boxes. Felix pulled them down and opened them on the floor. The first thing he found was a chem light, and he snapped it and shook it. A blue glow filled the small space in the center of the room, more than they were used to.

"Ammo clips," he said, passing that box over to her. "A couple first aid kits and some pills. Any takers?"

"Dibs on the pills," she said.

"I'll take some bandages," Leo said and glanced at his brothers. "You two hurt?"

Raph shook his head. "No...lots of blood, but it ain't ours." He watched his brother catch the bandages tossed to him and unfurl them, but he couldn't manage wrapping it around his upper arm with just one hand. Raphael leaned close and took the roll, gently winding it around the burn. Leo watched for a few seconds, then turned away. He picked out the small rag he used to wipe his swords clean and started one blade with the same faraway look he'd had at the lair, when he first told Raphael about the game.

Scraping claws passed the door, a group of feeders chasing down a screamer. In his corner, Mike looked up. All that stood between them and their claws was an unlocked door and his brother. Despite Leo's earlier behavior, or because of it, his presence made Mike feel safer. He sat with one sword in his lap, the other at his side on the floor, next to be cleaned. The light made his bandana stand out, now just a bit of blue under dark stains, and his eyes were clear, too clear. They burned. Mike looked away towards the others. He'd already seen Felix, so now he looked at Chanta, the girl Leo had said was dead.

Her hair was long, probably black, though it could have been all the blood matting it down. A large tangle bulged behind her neck that would probably never be brushed out. She wore a pair of large glasses, both lenses cracked, and a long burn scar covered half her face, leaving it reminiscent of Freddy Krueger. Accustomed to the darkness, she spotted his look and nodded. "Yeah, I'm looking forward to some major plastic surgery if I get out of here."

"How did you survive?" Felix asked. "You were good as dead when we left you."

"You left me in a room," she said. "I was safe mostly. And there were food packs and ammunition. It took a long time before I could hold a gun again, much less walk."

"Explains why you're so much thinner now," Felix said.

"Yeah, well, you try starving and see how good you look. And you?" She took out the gun he'd given her and examined it, hefting it in her hands. "This didn't come from in here."

"We found the way out," Leo said. "We came back to kill Stockman, but he sent us back here again."

"You had to fight your way back up?"

"Nope, we started on this level," Felix said. "Don't even know which level it is."

"Two above the one you left me on. That's what, seven?"

"Six." Leo put away his swords, now clean, and leaned back. "Four more to go. I'll take first watch."

They both nodded and sat back against the wall, drowsing for a few minutes until they finally fell asleep. He glanced at his brothers, as bloody as he was but suffering through it instead of wearing it. He looked down at himself. He was also covered in blood, but it didn't bother him. The first few days in the game, he remembered that it itched when it dried, but now he never felt that. Then again, it rarely had time to dry.

"You better get some sleep," he whispered. "I'll wake you later."

Mike didn't respond. He leaned on Raphael's shoulder and curled up a bit, closing his eyes and drifting off. Raph looked at Leo for a moment, then looked back at Mike. He put his arm around his youngest brother's shoulders and held him closer. "You think he'll make it?"

"He will. Both of you will." He watched Raphael nod once and fall asleep against Mike. They would make it. He would carry them through this. And when it was done, he would never have to carry anyone ever again. One way or another.

A world away, Donatello whooped with joy as he discovered Stockman's means of transmitting information back and forth between dimensions. Looking like a radio transmitter on steroids, the booster increased the signal and directed it to a miniature gate constantly held open. Too small to be noticeable or let anything through, it stood to reason that he might be able to send something physical through, provided that it was small enough to fit through the gate.

He found it in a side room with a sturdy lock, but one swift strike of his staff sent the lock across the floor. He opened the door and looked inside. Two large electrodes like the ones in the main room sent a continuous stream of energy to a single point but the amount of energy used was nowhere near as much as what sent his brothers away. He didn't go any closer but simply shut the door. Now he had the means, but he still needed something useful to send through and a way to pinpoint where it would go, ideally into one of his brother's hands. No, ideally into Raphael's or Mike's hands.

A communicator. He nodded once to himself. He had a spare in his lab. April could bring it over and then help him find a way to aim where it landed, probably by focusing the signal to one dot in particular. With five dots on the screen, there was a sixty percent chance it would go to one of his brothers. And if he could keep it from running out of power, maybe with a carrier wave...then theoretically he could speak with them and guide them through the map.

He sighed and leaned back in his chair. He'd already pushed Stockman's body behind the crates. It was of no use and he didn't want those blank eyes staring at him through the night. He picked up his communicator and called Splinter, and wasn't too surprised when he saw April and Casey looking over his master's shoulders.

"What's going on--?"

"Any change at all--?"

"Have you figured out--?"

"Hang on," he said, holding the device at arm's reach until the questions died down. "I think I've got an idea, but April, you need to come on down here. Oh, and bring your toolbox, my spare communicator, and food. It's gonna be a long day."

TBC...


	12. 12

****

Part 12

A light touch to his shoulder woke Raphael up, and he blinked as he raised his head. Leonardo knelt beside him, swords ready. "Wake up," he whispered. "Time to go."

"Hmm?" Raph nudged Mike even as he asked, "what about watch?"

"Didn't need you." Leo stood up and listened at the door for a moment.

Against the wall, Chanta turned her back to Felix and gathered her hair together. "Do me a favor, lop this off."

A slice, and several inches of hair landed heavy on the ground. Then another closer to the back of her neck, and the tangled mess landed on top of that. She tucked the stray ends behind her ears and stood, stretching muscles that had forgotten how to be sore. When Leo nodded all clear, they followed him back into the hallways.

Raph hauled Mike to his feet. His younger brother swayed slightly, then steadied himself.

"Must be getting used to this place," Mike whispered. "I think I can see a little better now."

Raph winced. That meant his chances of survival went up, but he didn't want his brother getting too used to this game. It had changed Leonardo so much already. But then...he frowned. Had it really? Biologically maybe, making him faster but weaker, sensitive to light, more ready to kill. But when he arrived home, he seemed wounded but not psychotic, lost but not insane. And now here, he protected both of them as usual, kept them safe out of the reach of these things' claws.

As they walked or ran, the killing came so often that it became a background noise, with only an occasional shriek penetrating his mind as he killed anything that got past the other three, allowing him to think about his brother. Leo hadn't been able to meet his eyes when he wrapped the burn on his arm. Either he didn't care at all or he couldn't bring himself to look.

He let us sleep the whole time, Raph thought. So he can't look me in the eye. He can knock all of us around, even Splinter, but he won't face me. He knows we can't fight on this level but he's protecting us. He has to. I'd be frustrated as hell if I was the one--

He paused to stab his sai through a feeder's head, wrenching his sai back and bashing the creature to the ground with the hilt. No, not frustrated. Shamed, he thought. He knows he has to protect us, and he hates it, and he hates that he hates it.

Guilt on top of guilt, and Leo would still break away. No matter how much he loved them, he would leave. He had to. He couldn't be that selfless to live forever for them alone. Raph held Mike's wrist a little tighter. Splinter was right about sacrifice, only Leo hadn't sacrificed his time. They'd sacrificed his life. How long would Leo, any of them, last in the world on his own? The way Leo was going, he'd be dead before long. Can't dodge every bullet.

The killing stopped for a moment. From the sound of things, there weren't many monsters left to kill, so they were probably closer to the staircase Leo had mentioned. Which meant more monsters to kill. He wanted to put down his sai. Holding it for so long made his arm ache, but when an attack could come out of the darkness, there'd be no time to draw it again.

Light, a star in front of them, blazed through the halls, and Chanta got off a shot before she had to look down. Mike took a step towards it, finally able to see. Around him, Leo and the humans turned away, shielding their eyes. Even Raphael had to hold one hand against it. Mike put his hands under the star and felt something drop in. The weight and feel were familiar, but only when the saw the communicator in his hand did he let himself believe it. The light snapped off, the afterimage burning red in their eyes.

"What the hell was that?" Felix said.

Mike flipped the top open and gasped when Donatello's face appeared with April looking over his shoulder. "Whoa..."

"Donnie?" Raph said, staring at the screen.

"Great, it works," Don said. "You have no idea how many times we calibrated the wavelengths--"

"Are you okay?" April cut him off. "We waited until there weren't any more of those things around you before we tried sending this through."

"You've really outdone yourself," Raph said. Something dripped on his hand and he looked up at Leo, mask freshly wet.

"He can see them?" Leo asked. "How?"

Donatello heard him but gave the answer to Mike. "Stockman had a constant signal from here to there. You're in a pocket dimension but I can see exactly where you are and where everything else is."

"The stairs," Leo said. "Can you see the stairs?"

"Better than that," Don said, "there's a shaft that connects all the floors. There are some black dots, but no more than the rest of the levels. If you take that, you can just go up and avoid everything else."

Raphael frowned and looked at Leo and the others, who were now gathering close and staring at the screen. In its glow, Felix seemed impressed but Chanta looked amazed, staring openmouthed at the turtle on the screen and then the turtles around her. Felix glanced at her and grinned.

"An' you thought this place was weird."

"Shaft?" Raphael asked. "Did you know about this?"

Leo nodded once. "He means the ladders."

Felix shook his head. "It's impossible. There's screamers all through that shaft, and we'd have to climb four stories up. There's no way we'd make it alive."

"There's more," Don said, winning the communicator back from April. "There's a list of every supply room Stockman made. From his notes, it looks like he originally only wanted a place to dump his hazardous and biological waste."

"Great," Chanta mumbled. "What the hell's in those pills I've been taking?"

"Plain aspirin," Don said absently. "But the supply room on your floor nearest the shaft has several barrels full of alkaline cleaners and battery acids. Combine them and you get one hell of an explosion. It should channel up and take out a good portion of those things."

"How the hell we gonna do that?" Felix said. "I'd rather go up like before. It's longer but I know we can do it."

"Leo," Raph said, "your flash bombs. You got anymore?"

"You mean the detonators inside?" Leo nodded. "I've got three more, but I don't think any of us know how to rig something like that. And we'd be too close to the blast."

"...I could shoot it," Chanta offered. "That sets off explosives in the movies, right?"

"It'll work," Don said. "And I can tell you how to rig them. You'll need all three, so don't use them. Oh, wait. You've got another pack coming."

Leo, Felix and Chanta all turned to face either end of the hall, but they didn't hear anything. Raph looked down both ways even though he knew he wouldn't be able to see anything, and Mike tightened his grip on the communicator, his only light. "Which way?" he asked.

"Um, two of you are standing together," Don said, "they're coming from that way."

Chanta turned and stepped beside Felix, bringing her gun up and sighting the darkness. The silence turned into a faint scratching that grew louder until the pack came around the corner, feeders on the ground and most of the screamers on the ceiling and walls. The ones in front flew backwards in a burst of blood as Chanta fired, distracting some of the feeders, but the majority of them leaped over the fallen and landed running, claws out. The familiar killing began.

"The supply room's that way, too," Don said.

Raphael caught a screamer hurling itself through the air, stabbing it and flinging it backwards. "Little busy here," he said, catching another on the tip of his sai.

Blood splashed the screen, and Donatello winced while Mike wiped it away. "Yeah, I see that."

Suddenly Chanta screamed and stumbled backwards, firing too fast to aim. She fell on her side with one of the small ones attached to her arm, claws digging into her shoulder while the teeth sank into her forearm. Leo and Felix never turned towards her, overwhelmed by the pack now that she couldn't help.

Raphael let go of Mike's wrist and fell beside her, stabbing his sais into its body over and over. Blood flew into his face. Somewhere between hits it let go of her and tried to crawl away. Chanta pushed the barrel right against it and pulled the trigger, slamming it into the wall. With it dead, she lay still, breathing hard. Another screamer leaped at them, followed close by a feeder, and Raphael had to turn his back on her to fight. Her ragged breaths sounded like screams.

Holding the communicator in one hand, Mike knelt beside her and held the screen to her arm, using the light to see the bite marks. In another dimension, Donatello and April saw the punctures up close before they could look away, gasping. Mike whipped off his bandana and tied it at her bicep, and the bleeding slowed.

"We've got to move," Felix yelled, "before they work around us."

Not bothering to ask them to wait, Mike put his arm under her and helped her sit up, then put her injured arm over his shoulder and brought her to her feet, keeping his arm around her waist. With him supporting her weight, she managed to raise her arm and fire. Her aim trembled with shock, but if a bullet took out half of a head instead of piercing right between where eyes should have been, it mattered little. Raphael glanced back at them, seeing the screen move more clearly than he saw them. Figuring she could guide his little brother, he followed after Leo and picked off the stragglers.

"I can't see here," Mike said.

"I can," she whispered. "Walk straight. A little more to the right, you're veering. There, that's it."

"Guess I'm not useless after all."

Shock made her legs weak and she slipped through the puddles, and after a few seconds Mike simply hefted her higher. Her feet barely touched the ground. Hardly dignified or even comfortable, it still let her shoot. A clip slid out of the stock and clattered on the floor. She stuck the barrel in her pants and dug out another clip, shoving it in one-handed. "You're veering left."

He corrected his angle. Blood dripped slowly from her arm and from the ceiling but he ignored it, imagined it was rain. Cold, thick rain. Back in the real world, April sat down next to Donatello and leaned on his shoulder, watching blood streak the screen until the tint went from green to red.

"Good thing we water sealed it," she whispered.

"Yeah. Good thing."

TBC...


	13. 13

****

Part 13

Blood pooled around his feet. Leo ducked his head as the rain became heavy, too heavy. This was more blood than they could account for. Despite their speed, they simply weren't that fast. The screeches became louder as they went on, and the light became even fainter as blood washed over the luminescent veins along the floor. All they had now was the light from the communicator, which made it dim even for the three veterans.

"We must be getting close," Leo said.

"How do you know?" Raph asked. He'd worked up close to his brother, following slightly behind to his left.

"They're killing their own," Leo answered. "Most of this is coming from the shaft itself. Imagine what the very bottom must look like."

"I'd rather not."

Screamers came faster, packed in so tight that the ceiling and walls seemed to writhe. Five screamers leaped at once at Felix, and he cut one open while two bullets blasted back two others. He ducked the last pair and heard them splat in the blood behind him, picking off the one Raphael didn't kill, and then whirled to catch another one aiming at his arm. None of them could stop moving even though their pace slowed to a crawl.

"Where the hell's this room?" Chanta yelled. "I can't see the walls."

"Five feet ahead," Don said, "on your right."

Felix laughed bitterly as he fought. "Might as well be five miles. Knew this was a bad idea."

Only the tight packing of the screamers saved them. The little things couldn't move nearly as fast as normal with other things in front and behind and to the side. Every stroke of a sword brought down three or more. Every knife slash took two. Every bullet passed through one and entered another. Even if there were a thousand, they could only come at them a handful at a time. Inch by inch, they made slow progress.

They had to trust Donatello's word that they were standing next to the door. They couldn't see it for the screamers covering it. As Felix was closest, he started the work of clearing it, kicking bodies out of his way as they dropped. Raphael had to keep more from swarming over what he'd clear, since Leo was too busy holding the rest back.

Behind them, Mike heard it first, the sound of a heartbeat growing. He turned, ignoring Chanta's startled yell, and peered into the darkness of the hallway. After a moment, she stopped yelling and looked as well. Her own eyes were better adapted, but she didn't see anything either.

"Something's coming," Mike whispered. "Something big."

The floor was beginning to rattle, sloshing the blood about like a storm. Chanta looked over her shoulder at the others. "Hurry up!" she yelled. "It's a demon!"

"Almost clear!" Felix answered. Without bothering to listen at the door, he pushed it open, slashing in a blind arc. His knife connected with the first screamer leaping at him, and its body held the door open as he moved in, killing the few that had somehow become trapped inside. Other bodies and bones littered the floor, likely eaten since they couldn't figure out how to open the door again.

Mike carried Chanta in next, setting her on the ground before tossing the bodies out. Raphael backed inside, and Leo was the last to come in, turning as they slammed the door behind him. Outside, the demon's roar echoed down the hallway and the walls shook as it pounded toward the screamers.

Felix heaved a relieved sigh but Chanta put her hand on his to stop him, and shook her head, motioning for them to be silent. Felix frowned. "But demons can't open doors," he whispered.

She nodded once, her eyes wide and fearful. She kept her back to the wall and her gun ready to be brought up towards the door. Felix and Leo exchanged a look, obviously not convinced but remaining silent just in case. As much as he hated to do it, Mike turned the light dark and the volume low. Donatello had a habit of speaking at the worst moment.

Outside, they heard the carnage as screamers skittered away from the demon while others jumped on its back and bit down. It banged itself against the walls, crushing its attackers, and stomped forward, dragging itself through the narrow corridor. Crunching bones and ripping skin filled the hall until everything was quiet again.

Inside their room, they looked at each other and waited, listening. Its ragged breathing was right next to the door. Slowly, the work of several minutes, it pushed itself back down the hall inch by inch, and the door would have shuddered if Leo hadn't kept his whole weight against it, pushing to keep it quietly pressed into its niche. Now Mike could hear them breathing, but only because they couldn't stop themselves from gasping for breath. All of them had to be exhausted.

The first ram took them all by surprise, and for the first time Leo felt this loss of his strength. He managed to shut it again, but only because the sudden opening also startled the demon, which had been drawing back for the next hit. Chanta raised her gun, ready to fire the moment she saw its eyes, and Felix joined Leo at the door. Their combined strength slipped as it struck, the door opening a few inches before they could push it back, blood trickling in from outside. Mike watched, but it seemed useless. Even if they hadn't been weary, they simply weren't strong enough to hold it at bay.

Dropping the communicator in Raphael's lap, Mike stood up and took a deep breath. He put a hand on either of their shoulders and pulled them away, a little surprised when Leo stumbled. But then his big brother had completely adapted himself to this environment, whereas he was nearly useless, too strong and too slow. He put his hands on the door, and when the next hit came, the door didn't move.

The demon was persistent. It struck the door several times, roaring as if its voice alone could take it off its hinges. Mike wondered if it was the hall keeping it from using its full strength or if it was simply not that strong, but he easily held the door shut. He turned and put his back to it, sliding down to the floor so that he could sit like Leo had before. He looked around at them, Felix leaning against Chanta who'd put away her gun and Leo leaning against Raphael, eyes shut, too worn to move. The demon smacked the door again, and he hardly felt it.

Mike grinned. "Get some sleep. I'll keep watch."

"Wait," Don said, his voice still low. "The barrels inside, what do they say? What else is in there? At least tell me--"

Raphael raised the communicator up, turning the screen on. "Don...shut up. Go get some Chinese and some sleep. We'll call you later." And he turned it off before Donatello could answer.

Beside him, Leo couldn't help a laugh. "God, I could go for Chinese right now." He used Raphael's shoulder for a pillow and breathed out, relaxing. Surprising himself, when Raphael put his arm around him, he didn't flinch. The demon's pounding faded away and he fell asleep, for the first time trusting one of his brothers to keep him safe.

In Stockman's lab, Donatello moaned when the small window on the computer went dark. He dragged it to the corner and brought up another window on top of the map, accessing more detailed notes about the room's contents. "I can't believe it. Couldn't even take a minute to tell me what the chemicals inside are--"  
"Donatello," April said, putting her hand over his. "You did good. You got them there in one piece. Now get some sleep. I'll wake you up when Casey comes by with dinner."

"You're right." Reluctantly he stopped typing and nodded. "You're right. You'll come get me if they call first, though?"

"Of course." She watched him stand and make his way to the sleeping bags she'd brought. Getting him away from the computer was hard enough, she wasn't about to try to drag him out of the lab. With his snores for background noise, she brought up Stockman's notes on the monsters he'd created, finding the same records about the feeders and screamers. While she didn't find anything about larger monsters resembling demons, she did find a record of what biochemicals and biological waste he'd been dumping. Their demons were probably nothing more than genetic mutations. Considering the source material...

She looked up at the screen again. Five white dots in a cluster. Dozens of black ones in the shaft a little bit down the hall. And nothing else. Whatever Stockman had been using to track his breeders, he wasn't able to see the demons roaming the halls. She curled up in the chair and stared, unable to think of a solution. If there were demons in that shaft, they wouldn't know until it was too late.

Sometime later, Leonardo opened his eyes, listening. No one else seemed to be awake. He sat up, shaking his head. After so much fighting, he knew he should be sore, but this world seemed built for endless fighting. It could've been a paradise if his brothers hadn't been there, if he'd been all alone, with an eternal enemy and mindless, meaningless killing.

"You awake?"

Leo looked up at Raphael, now at Mike's position at the door. He glanced back at whoever he'd slept against and found Mike curled up next to him. Nice trick. He must've been more tired than he thought not to wake up when they switched. "Yeah. I'm awake."

"Good."

"Is it my watch?"

"No. It's been almost twelve hours now. I was going to let you all wake up on your own."

From the sound of things, the demon was gone. Leo sat still for a moment, then realized his swords were still on the floor. He picked them back up and began cleaning them.

"Did you really poison them?"

Leo froze. "How did you...?"

"Splinter saw. When you drew on him." Raphael adjusted to sit cross-legged and leaned back again. "He said I should be careful around you."

"I would never hurt you."

"You beat us up pretty good. That doesn't count?"

"You know what I mean."

"No, I don't," Raph said. "You're making the rules up as you go, killing is protecting, running away is freedom. But I think you're starting to lose track of your own rules."

No answer. Raphael pressed on. "I don't think you want to hurt us. And I think you really do want to keep us safe, but you can't handle it anymore. And if Splinter won't let you retreat even a little bit, then you have to run away, no matter what happens."

"...that's about it," Leo admitted. His brother didn't answer. He gave a sad laugh and continued cleaning his sword. "It just happened. One day I could, the next day I couldn't. I..." He hesitated, then went on. "I was running the night I first came here. I would've kept going, but I saw the lights from Stockman's experiment, and then I met Felix on the roof..."

"And Chanta?"

"We saw her get pulled in. I don't know how he did it or how we were pulled in. Just that Felix grabbed my arm and then we were here."

"Mm." Raphael glanced up. "You were already running? Why'd you come home, then?"

"I don't know. I wasn't thinking straight." He took a deep breath and let it out. "Just a little longer. After I get you out of here, that's it."

"It doesn't have to be this way--"

"Yes. It does."

Across from them, the humans started waking up, their mumbling startling Mike, who sat straight and looked around quickly until he saw that they were still safe. Raphael let the subject drop. For now.

"If we're all awake," Leo said, "then let's see what's in here."

Raphael turned on the screen again. No one looked back and he figured his brother and April were still asleep. Using the light, he found two boxes full of first aid kits, pills and ammunition. Chanta got the bulk of that. There were a few food bars, but no one felt hungry. Then they aimed the light at the back of the room and found five metal drums, all corroding with hazardous yellow signs painted on the front.

Turning the volume back up, Raphael tried calling Donatello several times and wondered why he wasn't getting a response. Leo took the communicator from him, turned the volume as high as it would go and snapped "Donatello! Wake up!"

Donatello's head appeared as he sat up, obviously roused from a deep sleep. He looked around wildly as Leo handed the communicator back to Raphael, who knew that would have been his reaction too, since it was Leo who usually had to get them up.

"We found the stuff you mentioned," Raph said. "Now what?"

"Huh? Oh, right. Yeah. Um, the detonators in Leo's flash bombs. Get those out and attach them to the containers, one on the alkaline and the other two on the acids."

Leo separated the charges from the detonators and handed them to Felix, who tied the wires together and managed to hang them off the rims. "Now what?"

"Now you need to push them into the shaft. There should be a narrow walkway at the door. Then you shoot the detonators and take cover."

They all looked at each other. Donatello, safe in the lab, had no idea what they were fighting and what lay waiting for them inside that shaft. Even if the hall was clear, there were still hundreds of screamers. Whoever went inside that shaft, even just inside the doorway, was going to be bit. The only question was how bad.

"I'll do it," Leo said.

"You can't," Mike said. "They're too heavy for you to move alone. You'll need me, too."

"Mike--"

"Then we'll stay near the door," Felix said, "guard her while she takes the shot."

"And keep an eye out for that demon," Raph said.

Leonardo glared at Michelangelo, but he didn't argue. He just grabbed the top of one of the barrels and began dragging it to the door. Michelangelo took two and pulled them just as fast. Raphael checked the door, and once he saw that it was clear, let them out.

Dragging them to the door took less time that they'd thought it would. Nothing was left after the demon's attack. When they reached the door, Mike shifted the barrels around so that the detonators all faced the hall. Leo unsheathed his swords.

"When I open the door," he whispered, "push them all in as fast as you can."

Mike nodded and braced himself.

Leo kicked the door and caught the first screamer on his sword before it was all the open. Mike pushed as hard as he could, but with all three, even with all his strength they moved painfully slowly. Screamers flowed out of the open door like bugs, cut apart instantly and dropping to the floor. Mike wished they could leave the drums half in, but for it to work, they had to be entirely inside.

From his position, Leonardo was at a lousy angle, forced to slash over the drums. One of them leaped towards Mike and he sliced it in half, but the move left him overextended and a moment later, sharp teeth slashed deep into his left arm. He winced but didn't cry out, ignoring it for a minute as he defended his brother. Blood ran down his arm in rivulets as it readjusted for a deeper bite.

Suddenly the drums were all the way in and Mike backed away, scrambling more out of the reach of his brother's swords than the screamers. With the door blocked somewhat, Leo could afford to get rid of the one attached to his arm and followed his brother back down the hall, running for the safety of the supply room.

As they neared the door, three shots rang out, and then a burning explosion knocked them forward. Raphael caught Mike and yanked him in and Leo stumbled after, closing the door on the flames roaring by. After a few seconds the door was too hot to touch.

"I guess it worked," Felix said. "Now we have to wait for the fire to ease up."

When Mike nodded that he was fine, Raph left him and looked down at his eldest brother. Leo had collapsed in a corner, breathing hard. He knelt beside him and gently took his arm, holding him tight when Leo tried to pull back.

"Let me see," Raph said, taking a roll of bandages Felix offered.

"Not bad," Leo said. "Just messy."

"It's still bleeding," Raph argued, wrapping the bandages tight. "This'll have to do until Don can look at it."

Leo met his eyes, and both of them knew what he was thinking. That even if they made it out, he wouldn't stick around long enough for their brother to tend him. Raphael let it drop. They could fight about it later.

"You can't wait too long," Don said through the communicator. "The fire's good for one burst and it'll burn for awhile, but you're six floors up. You can go as soon as the ladders cool enough."

"Then let's go now," Leo said, standing and walking out before Raph could stop him. As the humans followed, Mike put his hand on Raph's arm so they talk alone for a moment.

"Is it really bad?" he asked.

"No...but I'm worried he won't be able to climb." Raph exchanged a look with him, and they followed them out to the shaft, the entrance now a melted hole.

About to go in, Chanta suddenly stopped and looked at them. "Those ladders go all the way. There are no stops, no rooms to hide in. If someone falls behind...stopping for them would be useless."

Silence. Mike and Raph both looked at Leo, but he wouldn't look at them. There was hardly a choice. Inside, the ladders were still steaming, but in a few seconds they'd be able to go. They'd have to go. If they tried the halls now, all the screamers from the shaft would add to everything already roaming around. The screeching of the few survivors grew louder. Felix took a deep breath and nodded.

"Then this is it," he said softly. "We live or we die, right now." He stared into the darkness and the horrible sounds filling it. "The Lord is my shepherd," he whispered. "I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters."

In the dark, cooling metal groaned as it contracted, sounding like mournful wails echoing up to the ceiling.

"He restoreth my soul. He leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for His name's sake."

Drawn by the explosion, the demon's footsteps became audible again, the floor rattling like bones. It roared, dragging its massive body through the hall, and no one knew what would happen when it reached the shaft and more space to move. Felix's voice grew louder, stronger.

"Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies. Thou anointest my head with oil. My cup runneth over."

Mike put one hand in Raph's, felt a reassuring squeeze. They would do this. No matter what happened, neither would be left alone. Leonardo did not reach for them but slid his swords into their sheaths. He would have to ascend on strength he didn't know if he had.

"Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life, and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever."

And they began to climb.

TBC...


	14. 14

****

Part 14

Four ladders lined the shaft. Before she reached the closest one, Chanta whipped off her torn shirt and wrapped it around her hands, protecting her skin from the heat. Felix didn't bother. The metal wasn't too hot to bear. He put the blade of his knife between his teeth and started climbing as fast as he could. Raphael did the same for one sai and started up, followed by Mike, while Leo took the last ladder.

A few scorched bodies hung off of the rungs above them, and if they couldn't climb over them they had to waste time yanking them off and flinging them aside. As Raphael jerked a large screamer out of the way, Mike paused and looked down. The body disappeared into the darkness, and a few seconds later he heard it splash. He glanced at Leo, who'd caught up beside them.

"Blood," Leo answered his look. "The first and second flights must be a small lake."

Mike grimaced and decided not to look down again.

They passed the seventh floor just as the demon on the sixth pulled itself through the blasted doors and into the shaft. It snapped up a screamer's body tossed from above, then made its way up the walls, digging its claws into the metal one foot at a time. Too heavy to move fast, it still climbed quickly simply because it's legs were so big. It roared, but none of them looked down.

Leonardo's hands were starting to tremble, from what he wasn't sure, shock, exhaustion, pain, fear. He didn't think he was scared, but he felt adrenalin coursing through him anyway. He wasn't afraid of death, far from it, but better to die at the hand of an enemy in a real fight, than in a monster's jaws. A few feet above him, Mike and Raph were climbing faster, and another screamer body dropped down, caught in the demon's mouth before it fell far. Another one fell, tossed aside by Felix, and the demon snapped that one up as well. Leo kept moving. If it was distracted by falling food every few minutes, he'd make it.

Farther below, something rumbled. Leonardo nearly missed the next rung when he heard it. After living in this place for months, he recognized things based solely on sound and though he'd never heard that rumble before, it had to be bigger than the demon following them. Much bigger. What kind of monster had mutated down in the lower levels, no longer afraid of the screamers that used to live inside?

Whatever it was, it sent the demon close to him scrambling to get higher, to get away. Leo pushed himself faster, trying to ignore the fatigue sapping the last of his strength. He was the closest one to it, and its teeth were coming close. A few more seconds and it would have him.

Something erupted from beneath them, shaking the walls so bad the ladders rattled and threatened to come loose from their bolts. Leo looked down and saw it coming, like an eel but more teeth than muscle, pure white and covered with blood. It crawled up the walls as quick as light and bit deep into the first demon's side. It screamed in pain and tried to dig its claws into the wall, but the bigger demon just let go of the wall and let its weight drag the first one off into empty space. They plunged into the darkness, and from below came a great thrashing and howling, until all that was left was the sound of bones crunching.

Leo looked back up at his brothers, now at the eighth floor. There was no way they'd reach the top before it came back up for seconds. There was no way all of them would make it. Then again, he didn't have a world to go back to anyway. He drew one sword, listening to the blade slide out of its sheathe. The walls shook as the demon left its kill and made its way back up the walls. Seeing it for the second time, he noticed the huge arms that rippled with every move, saw the eel-like tail that whipped around the ladders for support. Saw the eyes, the only creature he'd seen with eyes in this place. As it came closer, the eyes rolled back so that they were white and it opened its mouth.

Ignoring his brothers' screams, he jumped from the ladder, drawing his second sword in mid-air. While blind, it didn't notice him dodging the bite and driving both swords deep into its back. It threw its head back and screeched, and together they fell into darkness.

Mike stared in horror, watching his brother vanish, and then Raphael leaned down and yanked on his wrist. "Come on! Don't make it for nothing!"

Tears sprang to his eyes as he climbed, one hand over the other, over and over. He couldn't let himself think of anything else, or he'd fall into the darkness after him.

Leo hit the water and sank deeper and deeper with the momentum, the demon writhing above him. Bodies bumped against him. A moment later he realized that it wasn't water but blood, and he drove his swords in deeper. The demon jerked and flailed, able to swim through the thick fluid, and as it came closer to the wall he wrenched his swords free. He floundered in the pool, pushing dead screamers out of his way, expecting sharp teeth to grab him from below at any second. Finally he grabbed the nearest ladder, clumsily holding a sword in each hand as he pulled himself up. He gasped when he broke the surface, but the fatigue was gone. All of his strength was back, at least as much as he was used to now, and he climbed out of the pool as fast as he could.

Its massive head broke the surface, howling in pain, and its claws dug into the wall. Before he realized what he was doing he turned and stuck a sword into its back again. This time it didn't even flinch but kept crawling, bringing him up with it. He sheathed his other sword again and held on as it carried him back up, and as it neared his brothers, he twisted the sword embedded in its back, jerking it sideways. It stumbled vertically, nearing a ladder, and he leaped, relying on faith that he'd catch it.

He missed.

Before he could fall, though, Mike's hand caught his wrist and brought him back. Hoping his brother could handle his weight for just a few more seconds, Leo slashed as hard as he could toward the demon's neck. Instead of taking off its head, the blade lodged in its spine and he couldn't hold on as it fell. His sword was wrenched out of his grip and disappeared.

The loss hurt so much he would have gone after it if Mike hadn't held him prisoner, refusing to let go until he came with them. With a muted curse, he grabbed the ladder and followed after. In another minute, they reached the trapdoor above them and crawled out, falling on the floor for a moment to catch their breath. The sky burned red above them, swirling endlessly with unstable sparks of light flashing at the very edges of the pocket dimension.

"Damn..." Felix said, watching them. Leonardo was still dripping blood, leaving pools on the roof. "I really thought you were dead."

"So did I." Leo pushed himself up and spotted the gate matrix a few feet away. Chanta was already there, pushing the lever that activated the electrodes. With a familiar electric whine, blue lightning raced over them and shot out to a single point, ripping open a hole in space. She stepped through and vanished, and Felix went next.

Mike glanced at his brothers, then stepped through. Raphael took a step forward, then stopped and looked at his brother. "You first," he said, his eyes brooking no argument.

Leo raised his head slightly. "You guessed."

"Pretty obvious after that stunt." Raphael reached into his belt and pulled out something small and flat. When Leo saw it, his eyes went wide and he put one hand on his belt. The photo was gone.

Raphael stared at it, looking at the picture Leo had taken from the lair. "It's a good shot. I never really noticed before, but none of us could have taken this. You got us all and we don't even look crowded." He looked up at him curiously. "How were you gonna see this in the dark?"

"How did you--"

"Slipped out while you were sleeping." Raphael put the photo back in his belt. "You weren't planning on coming back, were you?"

"I can't go back," Leo said. "I fit here better than I do out there. You can't stand having a killer for a brother."  
"I..." Raph caught himself. Leo was right in a way. He protected them as best he knew and they condemned him for it. How else could a gang fight end but in blood and death? What did they expect, Leo not to use his swords and just knock everyone unconscious, and hey could you leave them in nice neat rows while you're at it? There was a reason Splinter had sent Leo instead of him or Michelangelo or Donatello. The eldest was supposed to take more damage and keep fighting, protect his family and friends, and if that meant killing... Raphael considered it. Did Splinter really want Leo to fight honorably all the time, even if it meant his death? The death of his brothers? No wonder his brother felt torn in two.

"You're right," Raph said softly. "We've made you live a paradox."

Leo didn't answer.

Raphael took a deep breath and looked back at him. "But I promised Splinter I'd bring you back home."

The only sound was the faint screams of things slowly creeping back into the shaft. Leo shook his head. "I got you here safe. Now I have to go get my sword."

Wasting no words, Raphael attacked. If he could land one hit, just one, but Leo was too fast. Nothing touched him. Raphael took some solace that his brother didn't draw his sword, even if all the poison had to be gone by now, and in return he didn't draw his sais. He simply had to keep on his brother until Leo faltered, stumbled or wore down. Every dodged kick, every sidestepped punch, brought him closer to victory, because from the way Leo was breathing, he couldn't last much longer.

As Leo ducked a kick, crouching low to the ground, he found he didn't have the strength to rise again. He put his hands on the floor to push himself clear, but Raphael's kick caught his side before he could move. Knocked to the ground, he winced as his brother grabbed his wrist and pulled him back up. As much as he struggled, he couldn't loosen Raphael's grip as he was drawn toward the gate. Together they stepped through.

To everyone inside the warehouse, it looked like Raphael was helping his brother through, and Leo's collapsing on the floor only reinforced the lie. He didn't understand. In the pocket dimension, he'd found the strength to go on as long as there was a fight ahead of him. Now the light bore down on him, leaving him almost blind. He relied on Raphael to help him walk away from the gate and find a small crate he could sit on.

Beside him, his human friends sat on their own crates, Felix catching his breath as he lay back, eyes closed, and Chanta staring at the four turtles, especially the one at the computer. April tried not to stare back. Chanta's hair, now obviously blonde, was heavily matted against her head with drying blood, and her face...April suddenly felt self-conscious of her own perfect skin.

Donatello noticed her stare and smiled nervously. "Um...promise you won't tell anyone about us?"

She grinned, and her skin twisted horribly around it. "Sorry, everything's gotta go in the report, but I think I can leave out the mutant turtle part."

"Report?" April asked. "What do you mean?"

"She means," Felix said, not moving, "that she works for Uncle Sam. And that she still hasn't apologized for dragging me in it."

"You wanted to come," she argued.

As Leo slowly caught his breath and felt a little more normal, he noticed that the gate was still open. Raphael stood between him and it, one hand on his shoulder just in case he tried to run for it, but a cold wariness settled in his stomach. Something was wrong. As much as he wanted to know more about the people who'd saved his life and whose lives he'd saved, he quashed his curiosity and interrupted them.

"Why isn't it closing?" he asked.

"It must be manual," Don said, looking back at the computer. "A cut-off command instead of automatically shutting down."

"Well, shut it down," Raph said. He wanted to walk up next to him and help, but he couldn't trust his big brother to stay put. He bent slightly and asked in a whisper, "can you promise not to try anything if I turn my back on you?"

Leo looked up at him with wide eyes, then back at the gate, a ripple of dark red against the light. Hell had never looked so enticing. He stared back at the ground and shook his head once.

"At least you're still honest," Raph said.

A moment later, Raphael was sent flying across the room and crashed into the wall, the crack of bone audible even over the sound of the demon's scales sliding on the floor. None of them had seen it come through, but they heard it howl and they saw its tail come around again, smashing the computer. The lights went dark before red emergency lights came on. Donatello ducked in time and stumbled back with April, both of them in too much shock to do anything else. It looked far different in real life than it had on the small screen. When it reared up to its full height, it towered a good extra eight feet over them. Covered in blood, Leonardo's sword still stuck out of its throat, jammed in too tight to come loose.

Chanta fired a few rounds but her gun soon clicked empty, and she had no more clips. Felix didn't even consider using his knife, not without cramped hallways and two swords to help. Instead they turned and ransacked the crates, looking for something useful. Mike knelt next to Raphael, helping him sit up. His right arm hang limp at his side, broken at least, maybe shattered.

Leonardo winced. The gate was gone, but worse than that, Raphael couldn't take charge. With a weary sigh he stood and drew his sword one last time, looking over his shoulder at Donatello. "Find something to kill it," he ordered, then looked away without wondering if Donatello would.

The demon centered on his voice. Holding his sword down at an angle, obviously tired, he stood between his brothers and death. In the red light, everything was made of blood, the walls, the floor, his family. Everything ran together until there were no morals, no rules, no honor. Just his enemy. He couldn't help a laugh. "Looks like I'll get my sword back after all."

TBC...

Authors Note: I've never written so fast. My eyes feel like they're bleeding as much as that demon.


	15. 15

****

Part 15

Despite the shock of seeing a demon and seeing it dripping an ungodly amount of blood, one thing penetrated Donatello's mind. No matter Leonardo's present mental state, a command from him, in that tone, wouldn't let him do anything but act. The computer was destroyed but there was a printed copy of the warehouse inventory somewhere in the rubble. He picked his way through the metal wreckage, wires still zapping and crackling, and started looking.

April knelt next to Raphael and Mike, taking shelter with them amidst several crates. There was nothing she could do to help Raphael that Mike wasn't already doing, so she peeked over the edge of the crates, watching the demon close in on Leonardo. "What's he doing?" she whispered. "He's just standing there!"

Leo tipped his head up slightly, not moving as it slithered closer. April put one hand over her mouth. There was no fear on his face, no surprise, not even anger. Just a cold determination that reminded her of the night he'd decimated the white claws.

Then the demon dived, jaws open, towards him, and Leonardo moved.

At least, she thought he moved. One moment he was there, the next he was standing next to its lowered head, slicing deep into its throat. Blood sprayed out and poured on the ground, but the cut didn't kill it and he didn't expect it to, dodging left as it turned its head as fast as a snake striking, its teeth snapping on empty air. It heard him moving behind it and turned, its tail smashing part of the concrete wall and the support columns in its way. The ceiling shuddered but held, pieces of glass shaken down as it roared.

April turned and sat back down, one hand still pressed tight against her mouth. She closed her eyes but she couldn't stop the sound of it howling. A hand softly touched hers and she looked up. Strange, but she hadn't noticed the blood soaking Mike's bandana. It made him look a little like Raphael.

"It's okay," Mike said, looking into her eyes. "He'll kill it."

She nodded once and forced herself to think about something else. Her gaze fell on Raphael's arm, hanging limp with the look of broken bones, but he didn't seem to be in much pain. Maybe it had to do with the dimension he'd just come out of, or it was simply the effect of having a demon in the same room. The only reason he didn't jump up and join Leonardo was his youngest brother holding him down, forcing him to stay still.

Hauling a twisted metal sheet out of the way, Donatello found the clipboard, singed but in one piece. He fell to his knees and flipped through the pages, passing the images of Stockman's engineered monsters, schematics for the dimension, mind boggling physics and truly ingenious equations. All that mattered right now was a bit of stock keeping.

"Found it," he yelled. He looked at the humans searching the crates on the far end of the warehouse. "Numbers fifty through sixty are munitions!"

Chanta didn't hear him but Felix did, and he grabbed her arm and pulled her down the row of crates, counting them off as they ran. At fifty he stopped and found a crowbar, and together they started breaking tops off.

Leonardo saw none of it. Adrenalin sang through him. His brothers were safe, the battle was his, the air lost all its resistance and gravity ceased to exist. He was death incarnate, protector and destroyer, this was what he was meant to be! He dodged when the demon dived, rolled under its swiping claws, came up under it and slashed through its skin, cutting open its stomach. Undigested screamers and feeders, all in various states of decay, tumbled out in a torrent of blood and acid. As fast as he moved, his right arm burned and there was no time to treat it. He looked around and saw that it had worked him into a corner, and acid was quickly spreading across the floor. With no place to go, he jumped on its tail and climbed up its back, using his sword for leverage when it moved.

There was life in it yet, whipping itself from one end of the warehouse to the other like a fish on land, its tail cracking the walls. Large chunks of the ceiling started crumbling away, smashing on the floor. Cold drops hit his skin and he looked up in time to catch a flash of lightning through the gaping holes in the roof. Fitting, he thought, it began with rain, it ends in rain.

Across the building, Felix and Chanta uncovered caches of small arms in the first crate, then automatics in the second crate. After sharing a look, they passed up crates fifty-two through fifty-nine and pried the top off of number sixty. Chanta gave a whoop of joy. A bazooka, gift-wrapped and ready, one round lay beside it. She reached down to pick it up, then frowned. She tried again, and she slowly realized that it was not bolted to the box, she simply could not lift it. Felix put his hands beside hers and, between them, they managed to haul it out and onto the floor. She went back for the round, stepping inside the crate and hugging it to her chest. After several tries, they succeeded in loading it. They shared another look. Groaning, she stepped in front of him and helped lift it off the ground, then positioned it on her shoulder, lowering her head. Behind her, Felix got it onto his own shoulder and bent down so that it was even, then tapped her shoulder so she moved right.

"Leo!" he yelled. "I can't aim this too good!"

Busy hanging onto the demon's back, Leo spared a glance towards his voice. In the red light, they appeared as one of Stockman's creatures, a small demon with four legs, four arms and a great eye staring at him. Then he recognized the missile launcher and looked down. The demon wasn't so big that its body would shield him from the blast. He pulled out his sword and stepped off onto a stack of crates beside it.

Felix fired. The blast deafened Chanta and she stumbled to her knees after it launched, hands over her ears, and the bazooka clanged to the ground. Felix ignored her, watching the round hit the demon's front and explode out the back and the mess that splatted against the wall a second before the wall itself exploded. That side of the warehouse finally buckled and came down, crushing its tail and pinning it to the floor.

With mortar and wood strewn across the ground, Leonardo could come out safely, walking around to its front. Despite half of its body missing, it still breathed, gasping for air and scraping its one good arm on the ground, weakly trying to pull itself out from the debris. Leonardo looked at it for several seconds, meeting its eyes. It stared at him, then opened its mouth and tried to bite, straining its neck towards him. It fell several inches short.

But the move brought his sword within reach, still firmly lodged in its throat. He reached and grasped the hilt, drawing it out, and with the last of his strength and weight in the slash, completed the cut. Its head rolled sideways, it blinked, and he watched the light fade from its eyes. Its body shuddered, the breath left it, and it completely relaxed.

He looked up at the sky. Rain drummed down on them both, and absently he raised his arm, letting the water wash away the acid. His right arm looked as bad as his left now. He glanced around for his brother but found he was on the wrong side of the demon. They were somewhere in the warehouse and he was practically outside, standing in the collapsed section. He froze and looked behind himself. The walls were broken wide open, the night was dark, and they couldn't see him.

Sheathing his swords as he walked, he walked into the night.

Raphael knew something was wrong even before he saw the destroyed section of the warehouse. He pushed Mike's hand aside and stood up, walking towards the dead demon. When he saw the destroyed walls, he knew where his brother was. Donatello came up beside him, reaching to tend his arm, but Raphael waved him aside.

"The communicator," he said. "Is it still on?"

"Huh?"

"Leo's communicator, the one you tracked him on." Raphael wished he could smack him to make him remember faster. "Tell me it's still on."

"Oh, right." Donatello pulled out the communicator in his belt and opened it up, and a second later a green dot flashed on the screen. "Signal's pretty faint. The batteries must be nearly dead."

Raphael looked at the screen and watched the dot, wondering if it was moving at all. "He's not far. Don, you get April and Mike back home. I'll follow once I pick him up."

"Whoa, wait," Donatello said, and April started to join in with her objections.

"No!" Raphael grit his teeth. Now was not time to let his temper loose. "None of you will be able to bring him home. It's got to be me."

"But your arm," Mike said. "If...I mean, if he..."

"He won't hurt me," Raph said. "I promise. Now get going. And Don, get the sick room ready, huh? For all three of us."

"Yeah, okay." Don tried not to look at his arm. "Promise you'll be careful?"

"Promise." Raphael took one more look at the tracking device, then left the warehouse.

Donatello watched him go, then glanced up at the two humans coming closer. Chanta leaned on Felix who bore her weight with a grumble. In the distance they heard police sirens and fire engines, drawn by the explosions. She grinned at him, blowing a lock of hair from her face and putting one hand to her ear, still ringing from the blast.

"You'd better take off," she said. "I don't think you wanna be around to answer questions."

"True," Don said. "You'll be all right?"

"No problem," Chanta said. "I got people waiting for me. Officers, bureaucrats, HMO specificied plastic surgeons..."

The sirens were coming closer, but Don had to settle it in his mind. "You promise you won't mention what we are? I mean, if the government got wind of us--"

"--they'd be more worried you weren't paying taxes," she said. "It ain't X-Files out there."

"But if you ever change your mind," Felix said, "let me know. You could put that genius to good use. The DoD would love you."

Donatello would have asked what he meant, but the sirens cut him short.

"Better go now," she said, and they watched Donatello, April and Michelangelo disappear into the darkness.

Topside, Raphael was still following his sibling. The moment he was out of Donatello's sight, he'd winced and held his arm with his good hand. "Dammit, Leo, you're really starting to piss me off." The sky was overcast and the rain cold as ice.

He found him only a few warehouses down the shore, limping, head down, leaning against the wall as he walked. Raphael touched the dark streak left on the wall at arm's level. His brother was still bleeding. He walked a little faster, stopping only a few feet behind him. Leonardo hadn't turned, though he had to have heard him.

"Leo, wait."

Leonardo paused, then turned his head slightly, not looking at him. "I can't do it, Raph. I can't. It's too much."

"Then don't," Raph said, breathing hard. His arm was starting to throb even worse. "Let it go, give it up, but just come home."

"It's not that easy," Leo said, his voice wavering. He leaned harder on the wall, still not turning. The thrill of the fight was gone, gravity dragged and the air turned to lead around him. "I can't mix and match."

Raphael watched him tremble, exhaustion beating him down. That demon had stolen the last bit of strength from him. He partly stared in admiration, that his elder brother had taken so much and was only now breaking down. He hoped he could do as much in the years to come. But for the time being, part of him was glad Leo was finally coming apart, making it that much easier to take him home.

"Either I stay and lose myself," Leo whispered, "or I leave."

"And go where?"

"...anywhere."

"Because," Raph ventured, "any place that isn't home...it's all the same?"

Shaking, Leo nodded once.

There was nothing more to say. He couldn't convince him here and now. That would come later. He stepped forward and dodged the weak punch. Leonardo was faster than lightning but too tired, too broken, to use that speed. Raphael grabbed the back of his neck and slammed him into the wall, and Leo barely turned his face aside in time. He cried out as Raphael held him still, his whole world reduced to just two sensations, the rough concrete beneath his face and the rain stinging his skin, washing the blood away.

"I'm taking you home," Raph whispered. "You need us as much as we need you."

Leo shut his eyes tight, and part of him wished he could stay right there, trapped in between forever. But then Raphael drew him back and led him on, keeping a tight grip on his wrist as he took him home, guiding him through the dark. Before they reached the lair, the darkness overwhelmed him and he was falling, falling back through the shaft, waiting to hit the bottom and wishing someone would catch him.

TBC...


	16. 16

****

Part 16

Raphael arrived at the lair no longer guiding his sibling but half-carrying him. Leo leaned heavy on his good arm, eyes closed, breathing deep. Raphael figured he was somehow sleepwalking and realized this was what people meant by dead on their feet. He was inwardly grateful to his brother for that small favor. He didn't think he could have carried him. Neither of them needed a shower after the long walk through the rain, but the burns and cuts on his brother's arms were beginning to look infected. Thankful that the main room was empty, he guided his brother to the back and into the sick room Donatello had put together. Michelangelo already sat on one bunk with Don looking at the minor damage to his hands, but he immediately turned when Leo and Raph came in and Donatello followed his look.

"Finally," Don said, pulling the blanket on the nearest bunk back. "You're turning out just like him, running around with broken limbs..."

"Quiet," Raph whispered, but he didn't think it mattered. From the look on his brother's face, Leo wouldn't be waking up for some time. He stood back for a moment, watching Donatello gently turn his brother's arms over to reveal the blood-soaked bandages and the new burn on his right arm.

"I'll be right back," Raph said, turning to go.

"Wait," Don said, "your arm--"

"It can wait. I need to talk to Splinter now." And before Donatello could argue, he left and headed for his master's room. He found him sitting on his usual mat beside his small zen garden, but instead of meditating, Splinter was staring at numerous sketches spread before him and occasionally flipping a page in an art book. Raphael knelt in front of him, looking over the sketches. He spotted himself, angry, accusing, glaring out of darkness at the viewer. He brought it closer and stared at it for several seconds, seeing himself the way Leonardo did.

"That is not the only one of you," Splinter said softly, motioning at two others side by side.

Raph put the first one down and pulled the other two closer. Drawn sitting in front of the television, one leg pulled up with his head resting on his knee, he didn't watch the screen as much as he simply stared into space. The other picture had him practicing alone in the main room, frozen in the middle of a spinkick. The anger was gone, replaced by calm concentration. Raph tilted his head. He almost looked like he was dancing.

"Leo did these?" he asked.

Splinter nodded. "I found them in his room. The...quiet ones...are far and few between. Most of these are angry, poisoned even--" He gasped as he noticed Raphael's arm. "Did Leonardo--?"

"No," Raph said. "It wasn't him, it was...no, that's important right now. Master, we need to talk."

"About the dimension Donatello spoke of?"

"No..." Raph hesitated, then pressed on. As much as he hated to reveal what Leonardo had told him, to help his brother he had to. "Leonardo had left before he was trapped inside that dimension. He was leaving us the night he was caught."

While Splinter's eyes widened, Raphael pressed on. "He couldn't handle being responsible for all of us anymore. He can't stand living the way we've made him live. You taught him how to kill and told him to protect us, but the moment he uses those skills, we condemn him."

"Raphael, he laughed in the midst of a slaughter."

"Who wouldn't?" Raphael shook his head. "Did we ever stop and think it wasn't insane, just...hysterical? That he's coming apart at the seams?"

"But Donatello spoke of disorder--"

"Only 'cause he didn't know what I know. Leo didn't talk to any of you, just me. That way I could do the talking instead of him." Raphael leaned back and looked down. His arm hurt even more, but this had to be taken care of first. "It's not a disorder. It's a nervous breakdown. He can't do it anymore."

Splinter lowered his head, and Raphael followed his look to the single sketch of their master, stern and authoritarian, with glaring eyes staring out of a smoky background. In the past three months, with the weight of the family suddenly placed on his back, Raphael could see where the image came from.

"He said he told you he wanted to stop," Raph said. "That you said he couldn't."

"Yes," Splinter said, "about a month before disappeared. In truth, I do not know how to proceed. That he felt it necessary to hide this aspect of himself...but at least you managed to bring him home."

"He'll run again," Raph said. "I won't keep him prisoner. I couldn't even if I wanted. When he heals, he'll be just as fast and skilled as before. He doesn't want to leave, but it's the only out he can see."

"Then he must want to stay," Splinter said. "We must convince him that his life will be better if he stays."

"Fifteen years of hating us won't be easy to undo," Raph said. He lightly touched the two sketches of himself, angry and demanding, alone and hurting. "He loves us and hates us."

"If you think it best Michelangelo heal in his own room--"

"No," Raph said, looking up with wide eyes. "No way. That's the worst thing we could do. In fact, it might be better if we keep those two real close for awhile. Make Mike stay in bed a little longer than he has to. Slowly bring him back into the family, and with someone who's seen the game first hand."

"Not you?"

"No...he'd just see me as proof of what he thinks is his failure." Raphael picked up one more sketch, titled Self-Portrait but showing nothing more than Leonardo's two swords, sheathed and in their display stand, with the look of a Japanese woodblock print. "He's gonna be a little...off...for a long time to come."

Splinter slowly gathered the sketches together and placed them on top of the art book. "He would not survive long on his own."

"He doesn't want to," Raph said. He decided not to tell him how Leonardo nearly stayed behind in the game, choosing a lonely, painful death over his family. "But if we can convince him that he can put down the weight, that he isn't responsible for us all anymore, that..." he took a deep breath, "that we won't condemn him for the way he fights now."

"Raphael--"  
"If he thinks he has to kill, then he probably has to," Raph said. "Do you want him to fight honorably if it means his death?"

Splinter hesitated, torn between life and the honor that made that life worth living.

"I'm sorry, master. Like it or not, we have to choose our own honor. Leonardo has seen too much killing, it makes it easier for him, but even if he hadn't been under so much pressure I think the only difference would be that he'd feel regret he had to kill." Raphael fought down the awful ache in his arm for just a few more minutes. "But he'd still kill. You've trained him to kill to keep us safe. All he was doing was keeping us safe, defending himself."

"I...must think on this," Splinter said. "You must be in pain. Have Donatello treat it. And if he is awake, tell Leonardo that...that he was right."

Raphael decided he wouldn't phrase it like that, but at least tell his brother that the weight was off, at least most of it. "Yes, master." He stood and walked out, heading for the sick room and not looking forward to the re-setting Donatello was going to perform.

Much later, as if fighting his way out of the ground, Leonardo slowly woke. The only light came from Michelangelo's bed, a soft night light that went no farther than his pillow. After watching his brother sleep for a few minutes, he sat up, wincing as the wounds on his arms flared. His body protested every move. He was breathing hard by the time he was sitting straight, and he leaned against the wall beside him. What was wrong with him? He hadn't been this bad off the first time, and that had been for three months.

A blanket covered his lower half, and his bandaged arms stood out on the brown cloth. They must have changed the dressings several times since there was no more blood visible. He lightly touched his right arm, swathed from wrist to upper arm in pristine white bandages, and winced. The acid burn was still sensitive.

He'd never been in this room before and figured Donatello had put it together while he was gone. The chamber was small than their rooms with its own door, and Don had moved some of his scavenged medical equipment inside. There were four beds, two by two, but he and his brother were the only ones inside. At every bed stood a nightstand, and Mike's held a playstation and two controllers coiled on top of the console. He looked down at his nightstand and found his sketchpad and pencil.

So they'd found them. Of course. After attacking them in their home, no doubt they'd gone through his room. They must have found the sketches quickly since there was little else inside beside books and weaponry. He looked at the door but realized he couldn't leave. He didn't think he could even stand yet.

The door suddenly opened and light spilled into the room. He turned toward the wall, shielding his eyes and wincing as he moved his arm to do so.

"Oh geez, sorry," Don said, closing the door quickly. He reached for a switch on the wall and turned the lights up to something resembling twilight. "I didn't think you'd be awake yet."

"Just for a few minutes," Leo said, his voice sounding as tired as he felt. "How long was I asleep?"

"A day and a half. Any longer and I was afraid I'd have to put you on an IV."

His eyes fully adjusted now, he watched Donatello walk around the room, setting down a small cereal box and milk carton on Mike's nightstand, an apple and a water bottle on his. "We have one?"

"We have plenty of new stuff," Don said. "While April and I were at the computer, I had Casey moving truckloads of equipment from the lab to here. Stockman wasn't gonna be using it anymore."

"He's still alive?" Leo asked sharply.

"No, he's dead. I don't know how you did it, the cut really wasn't that deep. But he's dead."

"Cyanide." Leo stared at the blanket, remembering that fight and the look in Stockman's eyes as he stabbed his sword through his gears and components. "I laced my swords with cyanide before I left."

Donatello paused. "Is that why you didn't draw on us?"

Leo shook his head. "No. I didn't draw because...I can't do that."

After looking over Michelangelo, Donatello sat next to Leo's bed and gently took his right arm, unwrapping the bandages and revealing the long burns. "You're lucky," Don said, "these aren't too deep. Whatever that thing used for stomach acid, it wasn't very strong. And that I cleaned it while you were out. Scrubbing burns is no fun."

As he took new bandages out of their plastic wrap (plastic wrap! he was in heaven) and started rewrapping the burn, Leo looked away, suddenly fascinated by the lines on the wall. He quietly sat through the redressing of his smaller laser burn, not seeing how his brother noticed. Donatello took his other arm and revealed the deep punctures that went from the middle of his hand to his forearm.

"Mike says you got these protecting him," he said softly.

Leo shrugged. "Not so much."

"He said you kept him from being bit by hundreds of...screamers?" Donatello pulled fresh cotton gauze (in neat plastic baggies and there was a crate more where that came from) and packed it carefully around the bites, then redressed it. "I didn't know my plan was so dangerous. I'm sorry."

"If we hadn't, we'd still be in there fighting. I had to get Mike out of there. A bite's small price to pay."

"Not just a bite," Don said, leaning back. "You fell into a pool of blood and bodies with open wounds. Considering how unstable their genetic structure was, I've been keeping a close eye on your own DNA."

Leo looked up with wide eyes, his fear obvious. "I might--?"

"No, no," Don said, covering his good hand. "You won't turn into them, I promise. It's just small things, like your hearing, your sight. Okay, that's not really small, but this is all conjecture, I may be totally wrong--"

"Wait," Leo said. "How do you know that? How can you even look at DNA?"

Donatello couldn't stop the grin from spreading over his face. "You wouldn't believe the equipment I've got now. Centrifuges, microchips, recombinators, the little box that sends light back and forth in scifi movies, everything! True, I didn't get everything in the lab, but I picked out the best stuff first and who wants a lousy pocket atom smasher anyway--"

Leonardo listened to his brother ramble about things he vaguely understood, occasionally waving at something in the room with one hand but always keeping the other on top of Leo's good hand. And Leo figured that this was the way he should have come home the first time, only he hadn't known the way back.

TBC...


	17. 17

****

Part 17

The sick room, he noticed, had one thing in common with the game. Time was meaningless. He was sure they'd been inside for several days, but all he could tell by was Donatello occasionally bringing in food and new bandages. He also wondered why Mike was inside when his worst injuries were minor burns to his hands from the ladders, but then Michelangelo slept almost as much as he did.

He looked down at his sketch pad and the half-done drawing of Donatello standing over his brother, applying iodine with all the grace of Florence Nightingale, and Mike howling with the look of Massacio's Eve expelled from heaven. As much as he loved their brother, Leo suspected the stinging remedies were Donatello's way of getting even at them for past transgressions.

Still...he had to admit they worked. He flexed his right arm and the burn only pulled slightly. There'd be a scar, but nothing too bad. His other arm would fare even better. The infection from the screamer's teeth was cleaned out and he had full use of his hand back. None of that would have been possible if Donatello hadn't looted Stockman's lab, and he chuckled, imagining Casey forced to drag crate after crate into his truck and down to the warehouse where they kept the van.

His family and friends were watching television right now, eating take-out and trying to keep their voices low because they knew he could hear and didn't want to wake him. But he still heard them laughing and talking, teasing Raphael about his broken arm. Splinter was not among them. He wondered what his master thought of him now, perfect son turned mindless killer, attacking his own family, yelling at him. Going so far as to choose death over them. The pencil slipped out of his hand and he noticed it was trembling. With a sigh he picked it back up and touched the tip to the paper, but he didn't continue drawing.

He knew what Raphael had told him, that Splinter had approved of letting go of the weight, but he had a feeling that his brother wasn't telling him exactly what had been said. If only he knew...was Splinter disappointed? Hurt? He must have seen the sketch of himself. Angry? Leonardo frowned, his own anger rising. So what if he saw? Splinter had no right to get angry at him, not after fifteen long years of service. Raphael could take off at night with Casey, but he had to stay home and practice. Mike could slack off and watch tv and play games, but he had to perfect his techniques. Donatello could hole himself away in his lab for days on end, but he had to keep on them to practice, wake them in the morning, see that they stayed in shape, that they weren't seen, that they were never followed home from April's, that they were safe in a fight, that they were never--

The pencil snapped.

He let out a breath and leaned back on his propped up pillow. Yes, he admitted, Splinter had raised them, protected them, and genuinely cared for them. Well, three of them. The fourth was a living weapon to keep the first three alive. He glanced over the side of the bed. Cleaned and sheathed, his swords lay on the floor next to his bed. Maybe his brothers were trying to tell him they trusted him again. More likely he didn't appear normal without them.

Paradox. Be ready to kill, but try not to. He hadn't told Raph, but he wouldn't have minded being their weapon if they'd just let him be that weapon. Killing didn't bother him much anymore. Does the sword care about who it cuts? But they constantly insisted that he draw his punches, dull his edge, leave his enemies alive, enemies that would surely come back and harm the family. At least Stockman was gone. No one minded Donatello's robbing the dead, either.

"Ah, you're up," Donatello said as he came in, carrying his bag of tricks. This time he remembered to close the door quickly and leave the lights dim. "We, uh, didn't wake you, did we?"

"No. I'm not tired so much anymore," Leo said. "But it's been four days. Why is it taking me so long?"

Donatello sat down and opened his bag, rummaging through it. "Considering what your blood test told me, it has to do with the air from the demon dimension. Essentially the higher amounts of oxygen combined with some enhanced enzymes that--"

"Don," Leo said, "in English."

"Oh, sorry. Well, essentially when inhaled, it converted lactic acid to endorphins and especially some unique poly--"

"Don," Leo said, "so I can understand it?"

Donatello looked at him for a moment, then half-smiled. "The air wouldn't let you get tired, but it gave you false boosts of energy. Now that you're out of it, you're feeling all the exhaustion you didn't before."

"How come I'm feeling more of it now?"

"You are? Um...if I had to guess, probably because you went straight into a fight when you got here. That must have depleted every last endorphin out of you." He finally found what he was looking for and pulled out a blue bandana. "Here, I made this for you. If it works, I can make a lot more."

"What is it?" Leonardo took it and held it out. Similar to the rest of his bandanas, the only differences were two black pieces of cloth sewn over the eyeholes. Already understanding, Leo slipped it on and adjusted it while Don went and turned the lights on full.

No pain. Leo looked up and saw in the same murky twilight most sunglasses give. "Turn the lights off."

Once the room went dark, he looked around. The only light came from under the doorjam as the televisions flickered, but he was able to see even better than in the game. He wouldn't have to constantly take them on and off, then. "Perfect. What is it?"

"They work? Excellent." Donatello turned the lights back on. "They're woven plastic fibers that Stockman had. I think he was going to use them in radiation experiments, but this is a much better use. I'll do five to start with. I know how fast you've been going through your masks lately."

Now if they would get used to a brother will completely black eyes, it'd be perfect. He looked down at his sketch and easily made out the lines. "You don't think they're going to get better, do you?" he asked softly.

Heaving a sigh, Donatello turned and faced him. "Technically speaking, your eyes are perfect. Your hearing is perfect. It's just that you see a different range of illumination. But no. If they were going to come back to normal, we would've seen some improvement by now, even a tiny bit. You were just...in there too long, I guess."

Strange, that that didn't hurt. Still, he wished he wouldn't stand out from his brothers so much, with eyes that would forever look black and soulless. "But Raph and Mike, they're okay?"

"They're fine. Better than you at the moment." Don walked by him and opened the cabinet behind his bed, bringing out the burn ointment for Michelangelo. "You don't have to worry about them so much now. You can take some time and worry about yourself."

As he went to walk by again, Leo caught his arm, stopping him for a moment. "Did he say anything?"

"Splinter? ...yes."

"What did he say? Exactly?"

Don paused, remembering what Splinter had told them. "That he had placed far too much weight on you, more than anyone could be expected to bear, and that you'd carried it for so long that you'd come apart. He said that from now on the burden is to be shared by all four of us, but he suspects that you'll continue to shoulder a lot of it because you still care, and that Raphael is allowed to smack you when you start taking more than you should."

"'Smack'?"

"Okay, maybe that's not exactly his word," Don chuckled, "but close enough."

Leo thought that over for a moment. "So...he doesn't hate me?"

"Hate--? Leo, no. No. He doesn't hate you at all." Donatello pulled a chair close and sat down, keeping one hand on his brother's shoulder. "He doesn't hold that night against you. You didn't try to hurt us, you were just trying to escape the only way you knew how. None of us hate you."

Leo swallowed reflexively and wouldn't meet his eyes. He wanted to ask another question, but he could only make himself speak one word. "Disappointed?"

"Not that either," Don said, shaking his head. "If he's disappointed, it's only in himself, that he didn't see what he was doing to you. What we were doing to you. We...we thought you would hate us."

From his sketches, what else could they believe? He shook his head once. "No. I...I didn't want to leave, not really. But I just couldn't see any other way out."

"I never even thought about how hard it was on you," Don said. "I'm sorry we were such a burden--"

"No," Leo said, looking up. "It wasn't that, not all of it."

"It wasn't? Then...?" Don tilted his head. "Then what is it?"

Leonardo hesitated. How could he explain the need to kill when they couldn't stand it? "I was raised to keep you safe," he started, "to protect you so that you three could have your own lives. And it gave me a place in the family. But..." He looked down again. "But I wasn't allowed to do it. When I had to kill, I wasn't allowed. If I can't kill, the threats will never end. Splinter made me to be a sword but he wouldn't let me cut."

For a moment Donatello digested that, turning the thought over in his head. "But...is every cut lethal? A sword doesn't just kill, it disables, it...it's so much more than just a killing tool. It's an extension of its user." He smiled sadly. "Leo, I'm grateful that you protect us. We all are. But no matter what you've been told, you're not your swords. A sword doesn't care what it cuts, but you do. You're not just here to protect us."

Don opened his mouth to mention Leo's occasional practical jokes on his siblings, signing Raphael up for the Barry Manilow fanclub not being the least, when he noticed the half-done sketch on the top of the drawing pad and his innocent torture of his youngest sibling. "Hey! They don't hurt that much."

Leo couldn't help a laugh as he looked at his sketch. "I notice you don't put iodine on yourself."

"That's because I don't get cut," Don said. "The worst I get is splinters."

Before Leo could reply, he heard Mike's quiet grumbling which meant he was about to wake up. A few seconds later Donatello heard them as well and stood, stepping next to Mike's bed. "Wake up," he said, tugging on the blanket, "breakfast time."

"Don't wanna..." Mike yawned and cracked an eye, glaring at him. "Wait...is the light on? Turn it off before--"

"It's okay," Leo said. "He took care of that."

Too curious to go back to sleep, Mike pushed himself up and looked at him through bleary eyes. "Whoa, spooky. Hey, does that mean you can look at the tv screen now?" Before Leo could answer, Mike was already uncoiling the controllers on top of the playstation.

"Not yet," Don said. "Breakfast first. You sure your hands aren't bothering you anymore?"

Mike waved him down as he ripped into the cereal box and tore open the bag, dipping the milk inside. "They're fine, no problem, you come near me with that red stuff and I swear I'll--hey, you forgot the sugar! I can't have cereal without my sugar."

"Live with it," Don said. "We're out 'till April brings more. If you want kung pao, though', there's plenty to go around."

Leonardo hefted the apple he'd been given. It was large and heavy, but that was all he'd eaten since he came back and he was starting to get sick of them... "Is there any egg drop soup left?" Mostly clear, just some egg, maybe a couple pieces of boiled chicken, he could do that. Probably.

"Yeah, plenty." Donatello smothered his grin and nodded once. "I'll be right back with some."

"Aww," Mike said as their brother left, "I think you 'bout made his day. Now here--" and he tossed the second controller onto his brother's lap. "I'm tired of this game cheating all the time. If you can see the screen now, then we can play!"

Setting aside his sketch, Leo took up the controls and looked up at the flickering light. For days Michelangelo had played alone, since the light from the television and especially the occasional sparkly effects had overwhelmed his eyes. "You're not gonna eat?"

"I'm a big turtle, I can do two things at once," Mike said, slurping his soggy cereal while waiting for the screen to load. A moment later two Crash Bandicoot cars raced down an icy slope hurling dynamite at each other.

When Donatello came back with both a single restaurant packet of sugar and a covered bowl of soup, he glowered at Mike but didn't say anything about the game. He simply set his packages down and sat next to Leonardo, making sure the dressings were still clean and secure.

"How's Raphael?" Leo asked while knocking Mike off a ledge.

"Doing better," Don said. "He's on some painkillers for the arm, but it's healing well. He just has to stop using it every time he feels like it. He's sleeping about as much as you two, though."

"Then why isn't Raph stuck in here?" Mike asked. "It's not fair."

"True, he adapted faster, but it was also less permanent. You adapted slower, so coming back will be slower."

"That reasoning is vaguely suspicious," Mike said. "It's been four whole days."

"And you've slept through most of it. Don't argue."

"Aww..."

Listening to them banter, playing games, working on his drawings openly, all felt like a strange version of his life that he didn't recognize except from half-conceived day dreams. Part of him wished they'd stop, that he could live inside the nightmare of killing and mutilation and horrors far more recognizable, grown familiar over time. And part of him, quiet and small, hoped it would never end.

Donatello was half-right, at least. A sword misused and ill-handled could turn on its owner, essentially what had happened to him. But a sword does not discriminate in who it killed, and he did. Mishandled, he still had not hurt his brothers. He could hold himself back from killing if he wanted.

If he wanted.

Leo glanced at his swords again. Maybe they weren't there to show him trust. Maybe they were there to remind him that they were swords, and that he...wasn't.

TBC...

Note: Fair warning...I think the next chapter will be the end. 


	18. 18

****

Part 18

A week after being brought home, Leonardo lay on his own bed listening to water rush through the pipes around him. Mike complained they made him get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom, but he found them comforting. They sounded a little like demons prowling distant hallways, but there was no threat beyond the occasional leak, so he could sit still and listen for hours without worrying about turning corners or hiding in small supply rooms.

He hadn't left the lair since he came home, not only because he didn't feel entirely up to it. His body was still a bit sore and he was still drowsy most of the time, but he could have joined Donatello if he wanted, moving new equipment from the warehouse to the lair. Mainly he didn't go because he didn't want to leave the lair and decide on the surface that he didn't want to come back. The urge to run was still strong, but he couldn't leave now, now when the weight was gone and all his pain was beginning to soothe.

He'd fallen into the habit of wanting to escape. Now that he didn't need to, he found the habit coming back anyway. In the middle of a game with Mike or a talk with Donatello, he found himself wanting to throw off the weight only to suddenly remember that the weight was gone.

A small pocket radio played next to head, turned low so no one else would hear it. Donatello had found several of them broken in one of the crates and put them back together, giving one to each of his siblings. Somehow it received down here, probably because of Donatello's reception array that took up a corner of his lab, his one experiment that had yet to explode. Old songs quietly whispered through the dark. He couldn't help a smile as Ozzy started singing "I'm coming home."

But what was home? Without the weight, what was he to the family? They had a genius, a child...he wondered if he could be the mental one but figured that no matter how much his brother matured, Raphael would always have that one taken. The artistic one? Or the one that liked to kill?

He turned off the radio and sat up. He'd been sleeping normal hours again but he still felt tired all the time. The lair was dark and everyone was still asleep, even Casey and April together on the couch downstairs. The lair was silent. Everyone was safe and sound, more or less. He sighed and closed his eyes.

Still, couldn't hurt to make sure.

He began his rounds, looking in on Mike first. With no need for light, he could enter without worrying that he'd wake him up. His little brother slept soundly on his bunk bed, one hand dangling off the edge. His room was its usual mess, but over the years Leo had figured out that Mike kept it that way to catch intruders in his private sanctuary. If you couldn't see in the dark, you'd have to turn on the lights or risk tripping and crashing into the wall. True, he'd started doing it at six years old and never stopped, but he now set the best traps of all of them, more effective than any of theirs out of their sheer simplicity.

Donatello's room next. Also asleep on his bunk bed, Don lay with one leg dangling off the side. The aquarium glowed in the background and the large computer hummed even when off, reminiscent of Stockman's own computer. He briefly wondered if they'd found his enemy's body but shrugged it off. Donatello knew the difference between alive and dead. If they hadn't found it, most likely he was crushed under tons of collapsed mortar and demon, and he had no urge to gloat over his kill.

Raphael wasn't in his room. Big surprise there.

He made his way downstairs and glanced at Splinter's door. They still hadn't spoken, and he didn't feel like risking his master being awake. He bypassed the door and glanced at Casey and April, fast asleep on the couch and looking exactly like his earlier sketch. For all her complaints about his manners and behavior, she could never get close enough when they slept.

Too tired to sleep and too restless to lay down, he walked onto the small bridge and leaned on the railing, watching the water flow. He wondered if anyone had ever done a woodblock print of a bridge crossed at night, and a river with highlights like knife edges beneath it. Probably not. He tilted his head and considered. It would probably make a good picture. He'd have to remember it.

"Just can't let it go, huh?" Raph asked in a low voice, coming out of the practice room, one arm immobilized in a cast. "Have to make sure they're all okay?"

Leo smiled and didn't look at him as he came near, leaning on the railing next to him. "Hard habit to break."

"...don't break it," Raph said softly. He lowered his head and breathed out, his shoulders drooping. "You know more about taking care of them than I do."

"Starting to feel the weight?" Leo asked.

"It's heavier than I expected," Raph said. "I mean, I got some of it while you were gone, but I was partly expecting you to come back, take over again and I'd go back to griping about you." He glanced at his brother. "I saw the sketches. We were kind of self-absorbed, huh?"

"A little."

"And...now?"

"The same." Leo smiled at Raph's crestfallen look. "Fifteen years, Raph, nothing that long changes that quick...no matter how long you stick me and Mike in the same room."

Raph had the grace to look embarrassed. "You guessed."

"Of course I guessed. Mike guessed," Leo said. "After the sixth day he realized why he was still in there and stopped complaining. Even if I hadn't noticed before, that alone would have tipped me off."

But not too embarrassed. "Did it work?"

"A little." Leo stared back at the water. "It'll never leave me, not completely. I'll probably always have a little of an urge to run. But...the two are kind of balanced now."

"Is that why you haven't tried to leave?"

Leo nodded. "I'm not sure I'll come back. A few more days, maybe a few weeks. I'll venture out again when I know I'll come home."

Raph grinned and put one hand on his brother's shoulder. "At least you're still honest."

They stared at the water in quiet companionship, and then Leo put his hand on Raphael's back and shoved him headfirst over the railing and into the stream. Raph's startled squawk disappeared as he hit the water, and for a few moments Leonardo savored the silence. And then Raph broke the surface, flailing in the icy stream and cursing fluently.

Leo grinned and crossed his arms, leaning on the railing and looking at his brother. "Do you have any idea how long I've wanted to do that?"

Raphael tried to splash him but only splashed himself.

He couldn't stop himself. He started laughing, but this time there was no hysteria, no desperate edge to it. Even as Raphael climbed out and glared at him, stalking towards the bridge and leaving little puddles behind him, he laughed and easily dodged his brother's playful swipes. He spent the rest of the night baiting his sibling, and if Raphael noticed that this was a kind of lightweight exercise for his healing arm, he didn't mention it.

The early morning hours found him in his room, curled up beside his table. All of his sketches lay stacked on top of it, and after a thorough search he found that nothing had been removed. Even his poisons were in place. A show of trust? Respect? Or did they believe in him so much that they'd never considered he'd hurt them? He couldn't tell and focused instead on a new drawing, Raphael floundering in the water like a damned soul and Leonardo above him like Raphael's cherubs. He wondered if the irony would be lost on his sibling.

The tap of a cane outside his room made him look up. He froze. Splinter stood there, leaning on his cane, tail tip twitching. He looked up at his son almost shyly. "May I enter?"

For a moment Leo couldn't find his voice. Nothing less than a revelation, Splinter asking permission. Before he had simply entered, which was why Leo had developed the habit of drawing while facing the door, so he could hear his master's footsteps better, see him enter and hide his sketches before he came close, pretending to read a tactical manual. "Of course, master."

He moved to stand but Splinter waved him down, coming closer to him and kneeling before him. Leo couldn't help but match his posture. It was second nature and that at least Splinter didn't try to stop. Some things would never change, after all.

"You can see clearly?" Splinter asked, looking at the mask that now covered his son's eyes and always would.

"Yes, master. As if the lights weren't on."

Splinter nodded once and looked down at the newest sketch, but he didn't see it. "Donatello says he explained what I told your brothers."

"Yes, master. I am...grateful."

"Grateful..." Splinter shook his head. "No, you should not be grateful. You should be angry, indignant. You bore so much with so little complaint, yet the moment you ask for relief, I turn you aside like a selfish child."

"You didn't know--"

"Exactly," Splinter said, and there was anger in his own voice. "I am your master, yes, but more importantly, I am your father. I should have known."

"You couldn't have," Leo insisted, keeping his anger at them but now finding that anger turning on himself. "I hid it from you all. I have fifteen years of practice hiding myself. It was impossible for you to know. I never said anything before then."

He paused, repeating that in his mind. I never said anything. I hid it so well.

For a moment, neither of them spoke. Then Splinter took a deep breath and looked back up. "Donatello also mentioned that you wondered if we hated you, if I was disappointed."

Leo half-smiled. "He set me straight pretty quick."

"Regardless, you should hear it from me." Splinter took his hand and met his eyes, at least as best he could, before going on. "I do not hate you. I could never hate you. Throughout all this, I was never afraid of you, only afraid for you. And for all you have borne, for protecting your brothers despite the pain, and for being able to let them begin to protect themselves, Leonardo, I have nothing but pride in you."

Now Leo was glad the mask covered his eyes. He'd never cried in front of his master. He couldn't have handled starting now. After a moment he managed to whisper "thank you."

A few minutes later Splinter left his room, leaving him sitting in the same position in semi-darkness. All the weight was gone, all of it, even the guilt now. Hard to believe, but he no longer felt it on his back and the lack of it both disturbed and relieved him. Similar to his fights, there was no gravity in the room. Air lost its volume and he felt light-headed.

He had never told them. He had never said anything. If they bore some of them blame for misusing him, he bore some for letting them. A sword did not care who it cut. A sword did not care who held it. But he was not a sword, he cared. On an impulse he grabbed his stack of old sketches and flipped through them, liberty, Donatello, Manhattan, Michelangelo, Raphael, Raphael, Splinter, his swords in their stand. He took out his self-portrait, thinking to rip it half, but as he held it up, studied the clean lines and the reverential presentment, he held it gently. He loved his family and took pride in protecting them. It was nothing to be ashamed of. It was just his fault for mishandling...himself.

He turned the sketch over and wrote #1 after the title. Self-Portrait #2 would be different.

"Hey, Leo!" Raphael yelled from downstairs. "Get down here before Mike finishes off the leftovers! I can't stop him one-handed!"

"Your fault for not asking for more sugar, right April? Raph, let go the chow mein!"

Leo smiled and put the sketch back with the others. "I'll be right there," he called, putting the stack away. Maybe in a day or two he'd visit April and ask if she had new supplies in. For now he stowed everything in the small table and stood up, looking around the room briefly. He didn't want to take down the weaponry displays, but there was plenty of free space along his walls. He could ask if she had confiscated any spray paint from the thugs she could beat up.

"Ow!" Mike yelled. "Donatello, you traitor!"

"Hey, I want some chow mein, too!"

He glanced around his room once more, then turned out the light and joined his family.

To Be Concluded with an Epilogue


	19. Epilogue

****

Epilogue

Three weeks after Raphael forced his brother to come home, he found himself running after him again, leaping over rooftops and occasionally vaulting over streets, using the moonlight to find his way. The rain had finally stopped, leaving the brightest stars in the cloudless sky, but it also left the rooftops slippery. He took out the tracking device and looked at the dot. Still hadn't moved.

It took five minutes to reach downtown. It took half an hour to scale the tall building without being spotted. By the time he reached the roof, he was panting for breath and leaning against the ledge, but there, sitting against an air conditioner unit with a large drawing pad, was his brother, staring without his mask at the sky. Raph walked over to him and sat down cross-legged.

Leo didn't look up or stop drawing. "How do you keep finding me?"

"Like I'm gonna tell you?"

"It's getting annoying."

"If I tell you, will you promise not to stop me from finding you?"

Leo put down his pencil and looked up. "Yes."

"Your communicator. Don's got a tracking device in all of 'em." He held up the tracker and showed his sibling the screen. "Follow the blinking dot."

"That's impossible," Leo said, frowning. "My com was destroyed in the game."

"Uh, hello?" Raph tapped the communicator tucked in back and to the right of Leo's belt. "You've had one since you came back."

"But..." Leo frowned. He honestly didn't remember picking it up and hadn't used it ever, thinking that Donatello was too preoccupied with his new gadgets to make new communicators. But apparently he'd had it for weeks and hadn't noticed. It was small enough to go unnoticed, durable, and probably he just never paid it any mind. "I think I know. When I first came home, I blacked out for a few hours. I don't remember any of that time. I must have picked it up then."

"And forgot all about it?" Raph asked skeptically. "That's sounds a little farfetched to me."

Leo glanced at his drawing, mostly darkness except for a few hazy clear lines. "No...not farfetched at all," he said softly. "Maybe I wanted to be found."

Raph thought about teasing him for being so hard headed about it, then let it drop. It had been a rough few months for his sibling, he could cut him a little slack. He reached into his belt and pulled out a small card. "Postcard. He sent it to April's shop."

Leonardo took the offered card and glanced at the picture of the Las Vegas strip, then flipped it over. Felix's handwriting, messy as usual, read "Still on vacation. Gotta love government jobs. Chanta's new face is on, looks like Marilyn Monroe now. Won a million at blackjack, gave half to Uncle Sam. Damn taxes. Later. P.S. Got called just now. Back to work."

"What're they doing?"

"Targeted assassination," Leo said as easily as if it were accounting. He noticed Raph's look and sighed. "They only go after bad guys."

"Uh-huh. And is that blood I smell?"

"Yeah, I ran into a girl gang knocking over a liquor store on the way here." He glanced at his sibling and noticed his look had darkened. "I let them live," he insisted. "Just a few shallow cuts."

Raphael's look didn't improve.

"Look, they limped away, okay?" Leo snapped. "In a few days, they'll be good as new and packing guns this time. Better?"

Raph held his hands up to mollify him and Leo went back to drawing. Raphael sighed. His brother was still testy about how he fought. Getting him to agree not to kill unless absolutely necessary had been easy enough. Getting him to agree not to mangle his enemies so they could never fight again was not so easy, and his idea of a few shallow cuts included slowly bleeding to death or even dragging themselves away screaming in pain. But apparently Leo was getting a little better. He looked over Leo's arm at the picture and frowned, unable to make it out.

"What are you doing?"

"Re-learning out how to draw light." They both looked at the ghostly white pillars in the middle of Manhattan reaching from the ground to the sky, fading amongst the clouds. "I'll never see the way I used to. But this, this I can see."

Raph looked from the light to the drawing and made out the shape this time, and he could even spot the technique Leo used to both blur the line yet make it straight and well-defined. "Your light looks almost as good as your water."

That got a grin out of his sibling. "Did you like it? It was my second attempt. I think I captured your splashing quite well."

"Some day when you're not expecting it, I'll push you into that stream," Raph said. "Of course, I could just grab you and throw you in. Not like you could do much to stop me."

Leo glared at him again. "Don't start that again."

"You've been skimping on your training," Raph said. This he wouldn't back down on. "I know, I know, you practice with your swords, but that's just to keep your speed up. You need to work on regaining at least some of your strength."

Leo didn't bother arguing. They both knew it was true, but if he would never be able to see like them again, he didn't know why Raph couldn't figure out that he'd never be as powerful as them again either. All his muscle was now tuned for speed, and in that none of them could match him, but as for strength...he had a hard time moving the heavier weapons racks. Even Mike could move the rows of spears without much effort.

"No matter how much I train, most of it won't come back."

"I know, but you still need to try." Raph smirked. "Either you get back to training, or I'll send you out with Don every day on his equipment runs."

Repressing a shiver, Leo tried not to imagine the hell of carting one box after another back to the lair, and some of those things were so heavy Don had to drag them... "Fine, fine. Whatever."

Raph grinned. This had to be the only perk of the job. "Y'gonna come home soon? I'm getting tired of running after you when you take off. And worried. No offense, but you're still not one hundred percent."

"Welcome to the Paranoid Fearless Leader club," Leo said unsympathetically. "You can be vice-president."

"Leo..."

"Just a few more minutes," he said. "I've got to get this down. I'll need the technique for later."

Raph considered for a moment, then nodded. "I saw the mural."

Leo paused, then continued drawing. "Yeah?"

"Yeah...for your first time with paint, it's pretty good."

"It's not my first time," Leo admitted. "I never told you guys about the graffiti I put all over this city."

"What?" Raph sat straight, eyes wide as his jaw dropped.

"You can probably still see them, the owners and residents never take 'em down," Leo said, oblivious to his brother's reaction. "My first one's aren't so good, but I still like my first dragon better than the rest."

"Dragon?"

"Yeah, wasn't so easy working in the dark back then. Now it's easier."

Raphael leaned back against the air conditioner rumbling behind them. Had Leo faced this dilemma, too? To tell Splinter or not to tell Splinter, that was the question. He decided against it. If Leo was right and no one was upset, what was the harm? And doing the mural for April's front kept him out of trouble, he guessed. It explained why the Chinese dragon curling around her windows was coming out so good.

"Did April tell you the latest?"

"No," Leo said, looking back and forth between the sky and the sketch. "What's that?"

"One of her neighbors loves your dragon. He wants to commission a snake for his tattoo parlor."

Leo paused but didn't say anything.

"And," Raph continued, "if it works out, he's got a Hispanic friend who wants a huge Virgin and a tribute to soldiers on the back of his church." He noticed the doubtful look on his brother's face. "April says she's willing to go between for a cut."

Suddenly Leo smiled. "So I'd be too busy to train? Tell her she's got a deal."

"Huh? Wait, I never said--"

"I'll want the right to refuse commissions," Leo continued, "and she'll have to keep me in supplies. And I only paint at night, and the client absolutely cannot be there while I work."

"Wait a minute, you still have to train--"

"Sorry, Raph, too busy to talk. But think about it, we'll finally be able to pay for our own things instead of living off April."

Raph had to concede that point. "...Splinter ain't gonna like it."

"You're Fearless Leader number two, you can tell him," Leo said.  
"Hey, you're Fearless Leader number one, you tell him yourself."

"Uh-uh, I only lead in a fight and when you need help."

"Okay, then, I order you to keep up with your training no matter how busy you are."

"Y'know, you're not half as good at this as I am. You really need to practice your delivery."

"I'm gonna practice throwing you off this roof in a minute."

Leo slipped his pencil into the clip at the top of the pad and tucked it into the back of his belt. "Okay, all done."

With a laugh, Raphael pretended to write a note. "Note to self: threatening to throw him off things works on Leo."

"That can go right next to my notes," Leo said, "teasing Raph makes him work."

They both stood up, Leo with a groan as he stretched out from his position, and they stepped close to the ledge. For a moment they simply watched the cars and people run by dozens of stories beneath them. From their vantage, New York glittered and sparkled and shone, as awake at night as during the day. Raphael could see it easily, but Leo winced slightly.

"They send you to get me?"

"Nah. I got worried." Raphael prepared to go down and slid over the side, glancing up at his brother. "You coming?"

"Just a minute."

He looked out over the bay at Liberty's torch, brilliant, blazing, a lamp in the night shining brighter than any star, and behind her a sea of darkness extending to the horizon. Without his mask, hers was one of the few lights he could stand, and with a sigh he slipped his mask back on. New York's light muted, turning from white to gold, but living in perpetual twilight was much more comforting than the constant shifts between night and day.

On his back, he felt his sketches more than he did his swords. His pencils and paints were becoming as important as his weaponry, a second way to define himself. Self-Portrait number two might be himself working on a large painting as it might be him practicing in the lair. Slowly he was becoming the artist, winning dominance over the mindless killer that would always sleep inside him. The outcome was not certain, not yet, but he had friends, he had family, and with their support, he did not think he would fail.

****

End

I want to thank everyone who read and especially everyone who reviewed. This would never have come out as quickly as it did without your comments to push me on. As I'm going into my next semester, I'll be drawing on your praises and few critical remarks to help sustain me as I begin and work on my master thesis. I've never had so many wonderful long reviews on one story, and I appreciate all of them, believe me. Despite the work, this has been a fun and rewarding project, and for better or worse, it's done.


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